


Spoken

by RenGoneMad



Series: Un/Spoken [2]
Category: Naruto
Genre: Anbu Hatake Kakashi, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Canon - Manga, Canon Compliant, Character Study, Fluff and Angst, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Minor Character Death, POV Umino Iruka, Pining, Romance, Secret Identity, Slow Burn, Umino Iruka-centric
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-22
Updated: 2020-07-01
Packaged: 2021-03-01 19:48:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 17
Words: 95,905
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23792596
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RenGoneMad/pseuds/RenGoneMad
Summary: The memorial stone should be a place to mourn the dead.To Umino Iruka, it's a place to speak to his parents, and the mysterious ANBU who listens.Follows Iruka from ages 10 to 26, and the many ways Kakashi changes his life.(This is the same story line as Unspoken, but from Iruka's POV. The two stories can be read completely separately and understanding of one does not hinge on the other, but I do recommend reading both if you feel so inclined.)
Relationships: Hatake Kakashi/Umino Iruka
Series: Un/Spoken [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1714090
Comments: 201
Kudos: 472





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Whoa. I’m actually following through on my promises? Whaaaat?
> 
> Seriously, I really hope you guys enjoy this, and I can't even say how much I appreciate all the comments on Unspoken, and how much I'd love to hear feedback on this as well. I won't lie, your comments are 98% of the reason I'm publishing this version. These characters are very dear to me, and writing these stories have been cathartic and helped me face some of my own issues, but it's hearing from you all that is motivating me to finish this series.
> 
> For any newcomers, welcome! You do NOT have to read Unspoken first. And don't worry, the entire thing won't be quite this depressing... I like a healthy blend of tears and laughter. You may also notice that this is written in present tense rather than my usual past. That was a deliberate choice to reflect Iruka's rather more in-the-moment mindset, as opposed to Kakashi's obsession with the past. I hope it comes across well.
> 
> Please enjoy!

The first time Iruka visits the memorial stone, he’s with his parents and he’s four years old. He doesn’t quite know why they’re there. They tell him a name, and though he can’t form the difficult syllables with his clumsy tongue, they bring to mind a vague scene. Not a face, but disjointed pieces that he meshes together into the form of a woman: a lipstick smile, swaying earrings, the chiming of a grandfather clock, the scents of freshly baked bread and lavender detergent. It only takes minutes for Iruka to forget the name he was told, but those sensory memories imprint on him, embed themselves into his mind, and stay there for the rest of his life. 

He doesn’t quite understand death at the age of four. It’s a word but not a concept. He understands though that his parents are sad, and he understands when they say that they’ll never see the kind woman again. He understands that the slab of stone in front of them is important somehow, understands that the white flowers his mother places at the base are meant for the “dead” woman. He wonders why they don’t just wait there for her if she’s going to come back to get the flowers anyway. He asks, and his mother just smiles at him. Her smile is watery, dripping with tears and trembling like ripples in a teacup. She holds his hand tightly as they walk away. 

Though he doesn’t visit the memorial stone again for many years after that, it isn’t long until Iruka fully grasps the concept of death. The first time he applies it to himself, he’s seven years old and Mizuki is telling him they’re going to die. 

They’re in a ditch. It’s deep, deep enough that Mizuki can’t begin to reach the top even when he stands on Iruka’s shoulders. Iruka doesn’t quite remember falling in--he hit his head, and Mizuki says he didn’t move for a few minutes--but he doesn’t think this is a dream. Sometimes he has nightmares, but they’re hazy things that flit through his mind and slip through his fingers like smoke. His happy dreams are more stable, strong, defined things that he can grasp and hold, but he’s never felt pain in a happy dream, and he really feels pain now. It throbs against his skull and cuts deep into the meat of his hand, between his thumb and forefinger. He thinks he sliced it open on a sharp rock when they fell, but he can’t recall. He strips off one of his socks and balls it against the wound, the way his father taught him to do. Iruka knows he’s supposed to count to one hundred before letting go, but he keeps getting distracted and having to start over again. The farthest he’s made it is twenty-six. 

“We’re gonna die.” Mizuki says, and it’s his tone that startles Iruka as much as the words themselves. Mizuki doesn’t sound particularly sad or scared. He just says it like it’s a fact, grim and irrefutable. Taiki starts to sniffle loudly, no longer trying to hide the tears that had started when he hurt his ankle in the fall. 

“Why d’you think that?” Iruka questions, and he almost regrets it when Mizuki turns his stare onto Iruka. Iruka hates that look. He doesn’t have a word to describe it, but it makes him feel like Mizuki knows more than he does, like Mizuki’s somehow better than Iruka. Or, at least, like Mizuki _thinks_ he is. But just because he’s a year older, that doesn’t make him smarter. Iruka’s father said so. 

“We’re lost, idiot. You took us outside the village, and now no one’s gonna find us.” 

Mizuki makes it sound like it’s Iruka’s fault, but he knows it isn’t. They had all agreed to go exploring. Even if it had been Iruka’s idea, Mizuki had taken the lead like he always did. Taiki and Iruka had just been following. 

“My mom’ll find us.” Iruka tells Mizuki firmly, although it’s more for Taiki’s benefit. He doesn’t like it when people cry. He tries to pat Taiki on the shoulder comfortingly, like his dad does for him, but it just makes Taiki cry even harder. Iruka grimaces. “She always does.”

“We’re out too far. We’re gonna die.” Mizuki repeats, and Taiki takes it like a rock to the head. That is, not well. He curls his knees to his chest and buries his face between them, smearing snot all over his pants. 

Iruka sighs and closes his eyes, trying to block out Mizuki’s expression from his mind. Then he tries to block out Mizuki’s voice, too, because he doesn’t stop talking. Iruka thinks he must sleep for a while, because when he opens his eyes again the sun has sunk low in the sky, nearly blocked out by trees. 

He realizes Mizuki has stopped talking. He looks to his friend, but Mizuki isn’t watching Iruka. He’s watching Taiki, who’s now shuddering and biting his lip so hard that Iruka can see pinpoints of red beneath the crusty mess of snot, mud, and saliva. Mizuki’s eyes glitter, and there’s an intensity in them that Iruka doesn’t understand. Suddenly, he feels like Mizuki isn’t his friend anymore, but one of the village cats eyeing a baby bird who fell from the nest. 

And Taiki _looks_ like a baby bird, thin-boned and knobbly-kneed and shaking with vicious tremors. Iruka doesn’t know why, since it’s not very cold. Taiki is breathing in deep, hiccoughing gasps, irregular and noisy. Iruka doesn’t understand why Mizuki looks like that, but he suddenly feels protective, like he needs to get in between the two boys before Mizuki goes in for a bite. 

“We’re not gonna die. My mom’ll come.” Iruka says it as strongly and confidently as he can manage, echoing the tone his dad uses when he tells Iruka that nightmares aren’t real. He scoots forward, wrapping his uninjured hand around Taiki’s shoulders, drawing him close. It’s awkward because Taiki’s taller than Iruka, and he’s also pretty sure that boys aren’t supposed to hug each other--at least, that’s what Mizuki says--but it seems to help, because Taiki’s shakes dissolve into tiny tremors, and eventually disappear entirely. 

When Iruka looks back up at Mizuki, the silver-haired boy is no longer staring at Taiki. Now his gaze is fixed entirely on Iruka, brows furrowed and mouth twisted into a jagged frown. He looks angry. “What makes you so sure?” He asks, and his voice is colder than the air now that the sun has fully set. 

“She always does.” Iruka tries to shrug, but his position against Taiki doesn’t really let him. He almost speaks again, almost adds “doesn’t yours?” because Iruka can’t imagine why Mizuki doubts it. Don’t all moms have that ability? Iruka has never questioned it before, how his mother always finds him in time for dinner no matter how far he’s gone or where he’s hid. 

Then, Iruka remembers, and he bites his tongue before he can say the words aloud. 

Mizuki doesn’t have a mom. 

That must be why, Iruka realizes, and suddenly he feels pity for the older kid. He doesn’t know moms have that power, because his own is gone. It’s probably best if Iruka doesn’t tell him. He doesn’t want to brag, doesn’t want to make Mizuki feel bad. Lots of kids don’t have both of their parents. Iruka had been lucky. When the last war ended, both of his parents had come back alive. 

“You’ll see.” Iruka ends up saying lamely, because Taiki is looking at him questioningly, like Iruka holds all the answers. While he _does_ , he doesn’t want to make Mizuki feel stupid for not knowing. Mizuki will realize he’s wrong after Iruka’s mother comes for them. 

And she does come. The stars are already high in the sky, bugs chirping noisily in their ears, but she finally comes. Her pale face shines like a moon against the black of the trees. She pulls each of them out, then carries Taiki on her back as they make their way towards the village. They meet another shinobi halfway there and he offers to carry one of them, but Mizuki refuses and therefore so does Iruka. He doesn’t want to look weak, and he doesn’t want Mizuki to have to walk alone. 

Taiki doesn’t really talk to them after that. 

Iruka doesn’t understand it, and he kind of misses his friend, but it’s alright. He still has Mizuki. 

When they start the academy, almost two years later, Taiki smiles when he sees Iruka. Then he sees Mizuki. His pupils condense into tiny pinpricks, his lips stretch thin and wobble, the blood drains from his chubby cheeks, and for an instant Iruka sees the same frightened boy that had trembled under his arm. Then Taiki turns, walks to the other side of the room, and he never looks back. 

Sometimes, Iruka wonders what happened in that ditch when he was unconscious. He wonders if Mizuki said something insensitive, like he sometimes did to Iruka. But then Mizuki tells him to forget about Taiki, and eventually, when the boy continues to ignore them, Iruka does. 

It’s fine. He still has Mizuki. 

The next time Iruka goes to the memorial stone, he’s ten years old.

He understands death very well, because he’s _seen_ it. He’s been carried away while screaming for the shinobi to let go, to let him help his parents. He’s seen his mother impaled and seen the relief on her paling face as she watched him carried away, relief because she knew that Iruka was safe even if she wasn’t. Even if her husband wasn’t.

Iruka sits in front of the memorial stone now, and he remembers that kind lady with the lipstick smile and the freshly baked bread. He wonders which of the names on the stone is hers, wonders if she was a friend or maybe even family. His own parents' names aren’t on there yet. The village is busy trying to sort out the damage done, someone had said. The new names wouldn’t be carved on the stone for a few more days. 

He waits there anyway.

He waits and waits, as the cold seeps into his muscles and his bones, as he starts to shiver though it’s still only fall. He waits until the sun sets, and rises, and sets again. He waits until his stomach cramps with hunger and he starts to wish he was back in that sinkhole, because even if he’d been tired and bruised and annoyed from having to listen to Taiki and Mizuki, at least then he _knew_. He _knew_ his mother would come, and that quiet knowledge had comforted him. 

He doesn’t have that anymore.

Iruka is ten when he realizes that it doesn’t matter how long he waits in front of the memorial stone... his mother isn’t coming to get him. 

Still, he waits, until Mizuki comes and physically drags him away to attend the mass funeral. 

His parent’s names are mentioned exactly once, at the end of the service when the initial list of casualties is read. More bodies may be found eventually. They’re still sorting through the rubble. That’s the hazard of a mass funeral, Iruka supposes. Some people are forgotten. 

The Yondaime is dead too, and his picture sits on the table before the assembled mourners. That picture is the only one. It shows him and his wife, a beautiful red-haired woman that Iruka has never met but has seen dozens of times. He guesses he won’t see her anymore. 

There are ribbons of every color decorating the trees behind the table, hundreds of them, most with names written on them in fine black ink and others which are bare for the names that are yet to be known. They dance in the thin breeze like a shimmering rainbow, their names appearing and disappearing as the wind whips them around. Only the image of the Hokage and his wife remain visible at all times. Iruka understands the logic behind it, knows that there’s no way they can fit hundreds of photographs on that little table, but it _hurts_. Because out of the hundreds of people that surround Iruka, who are mourning and paying their respects to the dead, none of them are thinking of Iruka’s parents. His mom and dad are just two numbers in the lot, two more names to carve on the memorial stone, their faces lost just like the kind woman with the lipstick smile. 

Iruka won’t let them be forgotten. He swears that. Even if he’s the only person in Konoha who remembers, at least _someone_ will. Umino Ikkaku and Umino Kohari left at least one thing behind in the world: their son. Iruka takes some comfort in the knowledge that, even if his mother will never find him again, at least he knows where to go when _he_ wants to find _her_.

So he sits at the memorial stone, sometimes for hours on end. Occasionally he spends the night, because there’s no reason to go home anymore, to an empty house with empty beds. 

He has to move out of the Umino residence before too long; they had only rented their property, and with the meager salary afforded orphans in Konoha Iruka can’t afford to keep both the house and the food in the refrigerator. It doesn’t take long for him to decide which one is more important. 

A few weeks after their deaths, Iruka moves into a tiny apartment in a complex specifically made for families that had been displaced after the destruction of the Kyuubi attack. Well, it’s tiny compared to the house Iruka had grown up in, but in reality it’s more than large enough. His bedroom is larger than it used to be, which is good because he won’t go into the living room. He takes the kotatsu and couch from home and stuffs them in random corners, but he doesn’t even look at them. He’s only ten years old and he doesn’t know how to take care of more than a single room, so he doesn’t. 

He even has a full kitchen, not that he knows how to use it. His parents had always taken turns cooking, depending who was home from their missions. There had always been warm food on the table. Now there’s instant ramen and frozen vegetables. Chicken, occasionally, and Mizuki teaches him how to use the oven to cook it. The look on his face is the same one from years before, but Iruka has a word for it now: smug. 

It’s not too bad. Dry and bland because Iruka goes to the marketplace for spices only to realize he has no idea what his mother used to use, but it’s edible. Since he’s moved, Iruka even has money for milk, though he hates to drink it plain. Still, he keeps it stocked, because he’s taken up his mother’s habit of drinking tea. 

She used to do it to relieve stress, she said. She often told Iruka that the herbs and flowers in each tea had special, unique properties, capable of many different effects. She made him chamomile before bed each night she was home to help him sleep. Kohari preferred black teas, drinking even the strongest ones without milk. Every year for her birthday Iruka’s father would buy her a new type of exotic leaves. He told Iruka he hated the stuff himself, only tolerated the black types with copious amounts of milk and sugar. He liked green tea, though, as long as it was brewed weak. Iruka tries to remember his mother teaching him how to brew the vast assortment of teas, a different temperature and length of time for each one, and he doesn’t succeed at first but it makes him feel better to try. Sometimes he brings the tea with him in a thermos to the memorial stone, because it’s starting to get cold enough for his tears to freeze on his cheeks now that winter is just on the horizon.

Iruka goes to the memorial stone most nights, as soon as the sun starts to set, because that’s when everyone else leaves. He doesn’t want anyone else to see him cry, doesn’t want Mizuki to give him _that look_ and tell him that “ _everyone_ lost _someone_ , you know,” as if that makes Iruka feel any better. But he can’t stop going to the stone. Not now that his parent’s names are finally on there, along with dozens of others. Not now that his parent’s names are just two in a sea of many and Iruka is the only one who remembers them as something more. He won’t forget them. He won’t leave them alone.

His mother always found him, so Iruka will always find her. 

If he cries a lot of the time he’s at the memorial, well, that’s his business. It feels better than crying alone in his empty apartment that’s never been filled with the smell of freshly baked bread, or lavender detergent, or properly-brewed tea, and it allows him to smile when he drags himself to school the next day. 

He cries for a lot of reasons. He cries because he’s so lonely that it’s a physical ache, a hole in his stomach, a sucking wound that just won’t heal. He cries because he misses his father’s hugs, even if he had said he was too old for them anymore. He cries because he wishes that nameless shinobi hadn’t stopped him from rescuing them, because maybe he could have made a difference. He cries because he knows he wouldn’t have.

He cries because he’s angry, and so filled with hatred that he feels like he’ll burst with the force of it. He’s angry at that shinobi, angry at the Kyuubi, angry at the village, angry at his parents, angry at himself. And he knows it isn’t reasonable, knows there’s no one but the Kyuubi to blame, but he wants to blame someone for this hurt. And he’s proud of his parents and their sacrifice, he really is, but _why did they have to die?_

He still has Mizuki. He sticks closely to his friend in the months after his parent’s deaths, although they never really talk about what happened. Mizuki doesn’t seem to mind Iruka’s clinginess. If anything he enjoys the attention, and he does his best to distract Iruka. Iruka lets him, at least when he’s not at the memorial stone. Nothing, not even his best friend, can pull him from the memorial stone when the urge to see his parents comes. 

One time he tries to talk to Mizuki about it, instead of just dancing around the subject and playing games. He asks Mizuki if he ever has nightmares. 

At first, Mizuki just looks at him, almost like he’s assessing him, appraising him. Iruka doesn’t know what he’s looking for. Eventually, Mizuki nods. Iruka feels hope. Then Mizuki starts on a grandiose story of terror and intrigue, one of imaginary monsters and wild chases. He does his best to scare Iruka, and Iruka isn’t sure if he’s grateful or not. Sometimes it’s hard to tell if Mizuki is genuinely trying to help and just very bad at it, or if he sincerely doesn’t understand the concept of comfort in the first place. 

Either way, that sort of nightmare isn’t what Iruka was talking about, and he doesn’t bring up the subject again. 

Iruka’s nightmares, the ones since the Kyuubi attack, aren’t about monsters. Not even the nine-tails itself. They aren’t about death, or watching his mother be impaled, or seeing the blood spurt from her lips. They aren’t even about being dragged away by a shinobi that Iruka doesn’t know the name of, but who he hates with an intense, boiling rage. No, his nightmares aren’t like that at all. 

His nightmares are about life before the attack. They’re about hot tea and warm meals and his mother reading to him at night. They’re about his father’s laugh filtering under the crack beneath Iruka’s bedroom door, or the scent of his mother’s shampoo permeating the humid air after she takes a shower. Iruka’s nightmares are about soft hugs and gentle pats on the shoulder, and his mother coming home after a long mission, tired but smiling the instant they greet her. 

They may sound like dreams, but they’re not. 

Iruka wakes from them in a cold sweat, his skin on fire and his chest filled with ice. His pulse pounds in his temples and his heart throbs against his ribcage, aching to burst out. He feels nauseous and his stomach cramps like with hunger pains, except he knows he’s eaten because the bland taste of the instant food still coats his tongue. Then it’s replaced by bile, and Iruka can’t taste anything anymore, anything except for bitterness and a loneliness so poignant that it seizes his throat until he can barely breathe and snot clogs up his nostrils. Tears stream down his face, and just existing hurts so badly, because he can never have any of that again. 

They aren’t dreams. They’re nightmares, and they drive him to the memorial stone because it’s better than the empty apartment he’ll never call home. 

There’s an old lady who lives next to him. She’s nice. She smells weird, like baby powder and lemon juice, but Iruka tries not to let his nose scrunch up when she gets too close. She brings him baked goods sometimes and though the cookies are dry, he eats them anyway. He can’t afford to be picky, for more reasons than one. Besides, she and Mizuki are the only people who have paid any attention to him since the attack, the only ones that have really tried to spend time with him. 

It’s not that the rest of the village doesn’t care, Iruka knows. But he isn’t special. There were orphans from the war, and there’s even more now after the Kyuubi attack. In a Hidden village, orphans aren’t unusual. If they’re too young then they’re placed in a group home. If they’re at least Academy age, they live on their own. Sometimes Iruka wishes he had gone to a group home, just so he wouldn’t have such a big, empty apartment. Then he gets angry with himself for being so weak. He’ll be graduating in less than two years. He’ll be an adult then. He can’t afford to act like a child. 

He’s just lonely, and there’s no one to talk to now. Mizuki’s a good friend, Iruka thinks, but he’s never been a good listener. He likes to hear his own voice too much, and the old lady across the hall is the same way. There’s no one to ask Iruka about school, or to praise him for good grades, and Iruka desperately wishes someone would look at him, because it seems like no one has ever since his parents died. 

Maybe that’s just an exaggeration of his imagination, but it feels real. 

It’s the only thing that feels real. 

The last of autumn is waning. The leaves have almost all fallen and Iruka dutifully brushes them away from the memorial stone when they get too close. He gathers them together and uses them as a makeshift bed, because it doesn’t matter that the cold bites at his nose and cheeks. It doesn’t matter that his hair is dirty and he’s thinner than he used to be, and his fingers are starting to grow numb in his threadbare gloves. It doesn’t matter, because he wants to be here, just in case she comes back. 

Iruka doesn’t remember falling asleep that night, but he wakes sometime around dawn, when the sky is lightening into a cool grey. There’s a thick blanket wrapped around him. For a minute, one tiny minute in which his head is still filled with the cotton of sleep and his thoughts drift lazily like in a dream, Iruka lets himself believe that his mother came back for him. 

Then the birds start to chirp. Iruka opens his puffy, bloodshot eyes, rubs away the crust of sleep, and blinks at the white stone too close to his face. He shifts back a little and the characters come into focus. 

His parents’ names stare back at him. 

Iruka blows his stuffy nose on his sleeve until his sinuses are clear. Then he pulls the blanket to his face and takes a deep breath. 

It smells like dust and soy sauce. When he looks closely he can see coarse fur in a myriad of colors clinging to the wool. 

It doesn’t smell like tea, and Iruka’s heart drops, because it suddenly clicks. He internalizes what he has been stubbornly denying in his heart for the last two months, and now he knows, understands…

His mother is never coming back for him.

Never again.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is a bit longer than my usual, but it covers a lot of important changes in Iruka's life, so hopefully you all enjoy it. It also explains something that many people asked me about after the end of Unspoken. I will say that everything in this chapter, to the best of my knowledge (and I did do a lot of research) complies entirely with (manga) canon lore. This jutsu and the Umino's origins aren't included in canon, but they don't contradict it in any way. 
> 
> Hope you all enjoy, and please let me know what you think!

Some days, it’s hard for Iruka to force himself to go to school. 

Some days, he doesn’t go at all. 

Those are the days when it feels like there’s a heavy mass in the center of his chest, weighing him down and pinning him to the bed. He can’t move, he can’t breathe, and though his stomach is gnawing and empty, he can’t force himself to eat. Just lifting a hand feels impossible, and he’s not even crying because he can’t summon the energy for it. So he lays there on his back until his tongue is swollen and dry with thirst and his bladder screams at him that he has a choice to make between dignity and depression, because the _toilet_ isn’t gonna come to _him_. 

Sometimes Mizuki shows up after school on those days. He lets himself in and raids Iruka’s fridge, slapping together cold cut sandwiches and yelling to Iruka from the kitchen, telling him about all the stuff Iruka’s missing at school and how he’s going to have to start selling himself on the street if he fails the Academy. 

Iruka normally drags himself out of bed by the time Mizuki starts banging pots and pans together, because he knows his neighbors will blame him instead of Mizuki and he can’t afford to get evicted. 

Though Iruka doesn’t say it, and Mizuki doesn’t ask... he’s grateful. 

On the days he does go to school, he tries to act like he used to. He tries to smile and laugh and make jokes. His mother used to call him an optimist, while Mizuki called him the class clown. Both of them fit, Iruka thinks, or at least they did. Iruka tries to make sure they do again, because if he just sits there and does nothing, allows himself to think too much, then he’ll start crying and he can’t let anyone see that.

After a while, he figures out that people talk to him more when he acts like an idiot. Rather than avoiding him because they don’t know what to say, they’ll laugh at his jokes or ask him how the hell he managed to survive after spray-painting the teacher’s podium bright pink. The instructors pay more attention to him, too, even if it isn’t the good kind. It’s better than nothing, and so Iruka’s pranks slowly start to increase both in frequency and severity.

Maybe it’s not the smartest thing to do in a village of shinobi, but it takes up the time Iruka doesn’t spend at the memorial stone, keeps him out of his empty apartment, and people are finally _looking_ at him again. He tries not to target students other than the bullies, because he quickly learns that people don’t really appreciate having water balloons dropped on them on their way into the classroom, and Iruka actually does care what the other kids think. They won’t talk to him if they’re angry.

When he’s busy thinking up new pranks, he doesn’t cry. Sometimes it even gives him a reason to get out of bed before Mizuki shows up, to shower and make food and act like a living human again. 

Over the next few months, Iruka’s bad days start to lessen, and he starts to talk to his parents at the memorial stone rather than just crying for him. He thinks his parents might have scolded him for exploding the desks, but at least it gives him something to say. 

As has become usual, Iruka isn’t paying much attention to the teacher’s lecture. He’s instead going through a mental inventory of the supplies he has in his bag and wondering if he has enough rope to pull off his latest prank. He thought he did, but now, looking at the width of Eisuke’s shoulders, he isn’t so sure. 

Mizuki steps on Iruka’s foot. Iruka hisses in pain, turning an affronted glare to his friend. Mizuki just looks at him with a raised brow, evidently unimpressed, and jerks his head towards the front. Iruka’s envious of that look. He’s tried so many times to copy it, but it’s difficult for him to force only one eyebrow to go up. One time he tried it and Mizuki told him he looked like a constipated mongoose. He’s only done it in front of the mirror since. 

Grudgingly, Iruka tunes into the classroom. About five students have their hands raised, and Iruka can’t determine any link between them at first glance. They’re from different clans, are different genders, and even _Makiko_ has her hand up. She’s an even worse student than Iruka has been in the last six months, with grades so low she probably can’t count to a hundred simply for lack of practice. Not an academic question, then. Mizuki nudges Iruka with his elbow and jerks his head more meaningfully towards the front, obviously telling Iruka to raise his hand, too, but Iruka’s learned to be skeptical when Mizuki tells him to do something without explaining it first. Last time he had listened to Mizuki about something like this, he had somehow found himself volunteering to help collect shuriken from the school grounds after class. 

The teacher nods and the students put their hands down, Iruka’s still firmly on the desk. Mizuki just huffs and shakes his head. Iruka ignores him to listen to their teacher. If Mizuki hadn’t raised his own hand, Iruka clearly hadn’t missed out on anything fun, but he was still curious what Mizuki had been trying to trick him into this time. 

“That’s a good number.” Jitsuko-sensei smiles. “All Hyuugas are technically sensor-types because of the byakugan, but there are many other types of sensory techniques that don’t require a doujutsu at all. Kenji-kun, who in your family is a sensor?”

Kenji looks a bit uncomfortable with the sudden attention. He plucks at the corner of his sleeve and looks away. “My dad, and my older brother.”

“And how do they sense chakra?” 

“They, uh… well, they… I don’t know, really.” Kenji ends on almost a whisper, looking distinctly embarrassed. Iruka doesn’t see why. He doesn’t even know what the teacher means by ‘sensing’ chakra, much less how someone would go about doing it. 

“That’s alright, Kenji-kun. It can be difficult to explain, but to some small degree, each of us have the ability. I want you all to close your eyes and pay attention to me, ok?” 

Mizuki rolls his eyes, and Iruka gets the feeling he won’t be closing his eyes at all. Iruka is curious, though, so he does as he’s told. At first, nothing happens, and he wonders if maybe he isn’t the only one playing pranks. Then a few people gasp, and suddenly Iruka can see Jitsuko even though his eyelids are still closed.

Well… not _see_ her, not exactly. It’s more like he can _feel_ her. She’s walking around the room slowly, weaving through the desks without pattern. Iruka cracks an eye open to peer at his teacher. Her chakra is flowing freely around her, like an orange bubble enclosing her entire body. Iruka’s jaw drops but he closes his eyes again, before she can see him looking. He’s never seen chakra in physical form like that, and he wonders if this is what the sharingan and byakugan can see all the time. 

“Ok, you can open your eyes. Now, how many of you could sense me?” 

This time, every single hand in the room goes up. Even Mizuki raises his, after noticing everyone else do the same. 

“Very good. Now, that doesn’t mean you’re actual sensors, of course. I was deliberately releasing my chakra so that you could feel my presence. Most of the time, people don’t do this. In fact, some people can hide their chakra flow so entirely that it’s almost impossible even for sensors to find them. A lot of these people make it into ANBU, where stealth is a primary requirement. A true sensor is someone that can detect people’s presence even when they’re trying to hide. There are a lot of different ways to do that, though. As I said before, one is the byakugan. With telescopic vision and the ability to see chakra, it’s basically impossible to hide from a Hyuuga. Yes, Nao-chan?”

Nao, a brash girl with tattoos on her cheeks, lowers her hand. “What about the Inuzukas? We’re known for our tracking ability.”

“Well, that’s a little bit different. The Inuzukas are _sensory_ types—not _sensors_. The Inuzukas track using their ninken,” Jitsuko waves a hand at Nao’s puppy, sitting on top of the desk in front of her. “Or their heightened sense of smell. This can serve exactly the same purpose, but it doesn’t technically make the Inuzuka sensors because they don’t have the ability to feel the chakra, or life force, of others. The same is true with the Aburame, who can sense certain things in nature through their insects. If you want a clan example of sensor types, I think the closest would be the Yamanakas, although I’m not entirely certain how their abilities work.”

This is all interesting, but Iruka doesn’t see what it has to do with him. He asks Mizuki, after class lets out and they’re all packing up their things. Mizuki gives Iruka a strange look and two words as an answer. “Your mom.”

Iruka makes the connection instantly, and he feels like an idiot for not seeing it earlier. Mizuki’s expression doesn’t help that feeling.

The supplies in his bag go unused, and Iruka instead makes his way to the memorial stone. He sits there for a long time, asking questions that he knows he won’t get the answers to. 

Except, there may be answers, Iruka thinks while laying in bed that night, sweating in his too-warm cocoon of gray wool that no longer smells of soy sauce but still has little tufts of fur stuck to it in places. He throws the blanket off and stumbles to his feet. He starts towards the door but pauses with his hand on the door knob. (He always sleeps with it closed. Used to, it was to block out the voices of his parents, talking late into the night. Now it just makes him feel like his house isn’t quite so quiet.) He runs back, grabs the blanket, and carries it with him to the tiny closet in the hallway. 

There’s no light in the closet, so he turns on the overhead of the hallway instead. He drapes the blanket on the hardwood and kneels on it, shoving aside laundry detergent and linens and other assorted items until he finds what he’s looking for. It’s a small metal box, one that Iruka had decided to keep when moving simply because it looked important. Inside, he knows, are things like birth records and his parent’s marriage certificate, along with a few scrolls on their lineage. Now, he thinks, there may be more. If sensing ran in clans like Jitsuko-sensei said then surely there would be something about his mother’s ability in there, right?

It takes him a while to find what he’s looking for, and he barely recognizes it when he does because it’s not what he expected. Instead of any plainly-written instructions or sheafs of paper that say “Hey! Umino secret ability here!” there’s just a few scrolls with a complex writing system and seemingly random designs. They look sort of like explosive tags, but not exactly. Iruka certainly hopes not, anyway, because he would have to question his parent’s sanity if they kept explosive tags with their marriage license. 

The next day, Iruka stays late after school and waits while everyone else leaves. Mizuki shoots him a questioning look, but must decide that Iruka isn’t worth waiting for because he quickly leaves. Iruka’s a touch hurt, but also grateful, because Mizuki is prone to making fun of him and that smug expression still irks Iruka as much as it did when they were six. 

“Jitsuko-sensei?” Iruka questions, standing politely in front of her desk. She glances up at him, frowning, and adjusts her glasses on her nose. She looks wary. She has every right to be, considering Iruka’s reputation lately. She tries not to yell at him, but he can tell that she doesn’t know how to handle his sudden trouble-making tendencies. It normally ends up in her ignoring him instead.

“Yes, Iruka-kun? Do you need something?” 

“I was wondering if you could tell me what these scrolls do.” Iruka opens the flap to his messenger bag and pulls out two, placing them on her desk. “They belonged to my parents.” 

Her expression flashes sympathy, and Iruka swallows down the pride that makes him want to say something rude or joking, just to get that pitying look off her face. He doesn’t want to be pitied.

She pulls them towards her and opens the first one. Her eyes narrow as she examines it. “This is a sealing technique.” She finally says, lips pursing in contemplation. “Umino…” She looks back up at him. “Your family’s from Uzushio, correct?”

Iruka nods. He doesn’t know much about Uzushio since it was destroyed before he was born, but he knows his parents escaped the slaughter and came to Konoha, like a couple others. He knows his parents were proud to be shinobi of Konoha even if they weren’t born in this village, and that’s all that matters to Iruka. 

“Uzushio specialized in Fūinjutsu. The Uzumaki’s were the more prominent clan, but the Umino and the Urayama came from there, too.” She pauses. “I don’t think any Urayama survived.” Jitsuko tapped her fingers on the desk before turning back to the scroll. “I’m no expert in sealing, but I recognize a few of these. This one,” she points to one of the largest two symbols, sitting in the center of one half of a figure-eight design, “means ‘chakra’. And this one,” she points to the other, “is for a barrier. Offhand, my best guess is that it’s a barrier to conceal or maybe concentrate chakra. I can’t tell for sure without looking up some of these other runes.”

Opening the other scroll, she takes a moment to look through it while Iruka tries to pretend he isn’t disappointed. He isn’t sure what he expected, but it wasn’t a simple barrier jutsu. “This one… it has signs for each elemental chakra nature. Other than those, I only recognize one other symbol. It means to ‘break’, or ‘disperse’.”

“Is there someone else who can tell me more?” Iruka doesn’t mean to be rude, but he’s tired and feels almost cheated by the underwhelming results.

Jitsuko sighs. “I would have said Kushina-san, but…” She frowns, appraising Iruka carefully. She seems to come to a decision. “I’ll speak to someone about it. Can I make a copy of this to bring with me?” 

Iruka hesitates, because it kind of feels like giving away a family secret, even if it’s complete nonsense to him. But this is the best he’s going to get so he might as well take it. He nods and Jitsuko uses a jutsu to copy the writing over to blank scrolls, then hands him back the originals. 

It takes a few days for anything to happen. Jitsuko asks for him to stay behind after school, and part of Iruka is sure he’s in trouble, even though he surprisingly hadn’t done anything wrong that day. She tells him to follow her and they set off into the village. It’s only a few minutes before Iruka realizes they’re headed straight to Hokage tower, but he doesn’t quite believe it until he’s standing alone outside the Hokage’s door and questioning all of his life choices since his parent’s deaths. 

His pranks have never seriously hurt anyone, he’s sure of it, but Academy students don’t get sent to the Hokage for juvenile misbehaviour. What has he done? Is he being expelled? Have they decided he really isn’t cut out to be a shinobi after all? None of those options seems likely at all, but he can’t think of anything else. He sits and waits, fidgeting, and hopes against hope that this isn’t going to result in him becoming a missing-nin. Does he even count as a nin at this point?

When the door opens, Iruka enters slowly, feeling like he’s walking to the gallows. He can’t see anyone in the room other than the Hokage himself, who is sitting behind his desk and puffing on a pipe. Gray smoke curls towards the ceiling as he lowers it. “Iruka-kun.” The Sandaime smiles welcomingly. It isn’t enough to assuage Iruka’s nerves. 

“Hokage-sama.” Iruka bends forward in a bow, not quite certain of the etiquette when meeting with the Hokage but fairly positive that being overly polite can’t hurt.

“Do you know why you’re here?”

“No, Hokage-sama.” 

“Jitsuko-sensei brought me some rather interesting scrolls yesterday. She said they belonged to your parents, and that you want to know what they mean.” The Sandaime makes a sweeping gesture to his desk. Iruka takes a step closer to see the two copies spread out on top, weights holding them down at the corners. “I’m not an expert in Fūinjutsu, I’m afraid, but I’m familiar with these.”

“You are?” Iruka’s eyes widen, then disappointment makes his shoulders droop. “I thought they were Umino clan jutsu.”

“And you are correct. As I’m sure you know, your family hails from Uzushio, a Hidden village destroyed during the Second Great Shinobi War. Konoha and Uzushio have always had strong ties due to our founding clans being distant relatives. Not many survived it’s destruction, but of those that did, several came here. Your parents were among them. As part of the agreement to allow them to become full shinobi of Konoha, they gave copies of several clan jutsu to the Nidaime Hokage. It was only two years afterwards that I became Hokage. As part of the process, I had to look through many of our records. This was one of the more interesting ones.” Sandaime chuckles. Iruka doesn’t really see the humor. 

“So, what do they do?” He asks impatiently, only afterwards remembering his manners and tacking on a belated “Hokage-sama.”

The Sandaime gives him a kind smile. “Let’s start at the basics. What do you know about Fūinjutsu, Iruka-kun?”

As it turns out, not a lot. The Hokage refuses to tell him what the scrolls contain. Instead, he assigns Iruka research and promises that all will be revealed—in time. Iruka’s restless, but he can’t exactly force the Sandaime into anything, even if it does just sound like he’s assigning Iruka extra homework. He drops by the Konoha library on his way home and picks up the books the Sandaime wrote down for him, and when he gets home he curls up on his twin bed and studies them. 

One is a work on chakra natures, the elemental sources of chakra that Iruka has vaguely learned about in the Academy but never studied intently. He doesn’t know what his own nature is, or what his parents’ were. The second text is a slim little book that looks like it was probably written before Konoha even existed. Faded script on the cover simply says “Fūinjutsu.” Iruka hopes the contents are more descriptive. 

For the first time since the Kyuubi attack Iruka feels like he has a purpose, and instead of pulling pranks or hanging out with Mizuki after school, he spends his time studying the books. He doesn’t tell Mizuki what he’s doing, for the simple reason that this feels like something… special. A family secret. Plus, he doesn’t even know what he’s learning, not yet. Mizuki’s voice turns cold when Iruka spends too much time away from him, so he makes an effort to spend at least one day a week doing whatever Mizuki wants. He figures Mizuki’s lonely since he doesn’t have many friends at school, and Iruka knows all too well what that feels like.

He still goes to the memorial stone, of course, at least a few times a week. It isn’t as though the pain has disappeared over the last six months, or even lessened. It’s more that he can sometimes _forget_ about the pain, just for a little while, and focus his mind on something else. He feels like learning this jutsu is a way of remembering his parents, too, and he likes the sense of working towards a specific goal. It keeps him busy.

The Sandaime finds him at the memorial stone once, when Iruka’s been crying, and his first instinct is shame, because he doesn’t _want_ to be weak. He tries to cover it with anger. He tells the Sandaime that he’s proud of his parents—proud of what they sacrificed for Konoha, and happy that he was their son. He is proud of them, he _really_ is. But he’s also _hurting_ , and _tired_ , and when the Sandaime pulls him into a warm embrace and tells him that he’s not alone, Iruka sobs even harder. 

For the first time in six months, it feels like someone _sees_ him.

That’s what first makes him think of the Sandaime as more than a weird old man, but it doesn’t take long for that single thought to become more. He starts meeting with the Sandaime every week or two. Each time they start with tea (he teaches Iruka how to properly brew kombucha, his favorite) and he asks Iruka how his classes are going. Then, strangely, he actually listens to the answer. _Really_ listens, like Iruka’s parents used to. His eyes glitter when he chuckles at some of Iruka’s lesser pranks (and Iruka starts to reign that in a bit, too, because he doesn’t want the Hokage to think any less of him), and he asks questions about Iruka’s taijutsu or weapons training, and occasionally offers a suggestion or a different perspective that helps Iruka a lot more than anything his teacher says.

Then they start working. Iruka pulls out his notes and asks any questions he didn’t understand from the books, or shows the Sandaime what part he’s made it to. At first he’s hesitant to admit he doesn’t get something, because this is the _Hokage_ , the strongest shinobi in the entire village. But the Sandaime never treats Iruka like he’s stupid, never looks down on him. He just answers the best he can, taking time to explain details and never rushing Iruka to leave. He acts like spending time with Iruka is his favorite thing in the world, and although they don’t always get to meet every week (he is the leader of an entire village, after all, even Iruka knows he has to have real responsibilities), the Sandaime always listens to Iruka when he’s there.

A small voice in Iruka’s heart says that it’s almost like having family again. 

He keeps studying Fūinjutsu, and though he doesn’t take his books to the memorial stone or school, he spends almost all of his free time in his apartment pouring over the materials. 

At some point, he even starts to use the old kotatsu again. Iruka’s apartment has never felt more like home than when he sits under it, the scent of hot tea filling the air, studying his mother’s jutsu, with the gray wool blanket draped over his shoulders. 

Iruka understands that the blanket isn’t from his parents. He doesn’t know where it came from, or who decided to cover him up that cold winter night, but it wasn’t the ghosts of dead people. He’s thankful for it nonetheless. It makes the Sandaime’s words about the Will of Fire and the village being a community seem all the more real.

Slowly, the pieces start coming together; both those of Iruka’s life, and his mother’s secret.

When Iruka finally learns his mother’s jutsu, he’s eleven and it’s only a few weeks until graduation.

“I think you’re ready.” The Sandaime says. Iruka looks up from his finger, where he’s showing the Hokage his latest foray into condensing chakra onto the point of a fingernail, using a simple barrier to keep it in place. The Finger-Carving Seal, the Hokage had called it (though Iruka can’t see why anyone would want to use their finger to carve something), layered underneath a simple barrier seal. It had taken him several months to figure out how to feed chakra into two techniques of Fūinjutsu at once, but he’s proud to say he’s basically mastered it.

“Ready?” Iruka repeats dumbly. His focus is broken and the chakra dissipates, both seals disappearing. The Hokage’s words start to sink in. Iruka’s eyes light up and he shifts excitedly in his seat. “Really?”

“Quite.” The Sandaime puffs idly on his pipe. Iruka’s gotten used to the smell, and his nose doesn’t even crinkle as the old man leans forward. “I’m going to guide you through each step. You must keep your concentration, Iruka-kun.” 

His heart hammers in his chest and he nods, trying to look adult-like and not overly eager, but he’s been waiting for this moment for what feels like years. The secret. What all of this work had been for. 

For a second, Iruka wonders if the Hokage will stop meeting with him once he learns the jutsu. The thought makes something cold, like a chunk of lead, drop into his stomach. He swallows and tries to shake the feeling off when the Sandaime begins to speak.

“Using the same technique as the Finger Carving Seal, I want you to gather yang chakra to the center of your dominant palm, contained by a three-point barrier seal.” 

Iruka opens his right hand and looks down at it, mentally forming a focus point where his Wisdom and Fate lines meet. He can form the barrier without needing to draw the symbols now, as long as he concentrates, the scrawling black script growing from his palm as a manifestation of his chakra. Iruka breathes out slowly as he forms the barrier, then begins channeling chakra to that point, easing it through the pathways that the seal leaves open for him. 

Yang release is difficult for Iruka, doesn’t come as easily as his water nature chakra, but it’s possible. The Sandaime says that not everyone can do it at all, that it runs in families. He says the Akimichis are one of the only families in Konoha that can, (along with the Sarutobis) but that there were several clans in Uzushio who specialized in it. Yang chakra is different from elemental releases, and Iruka thinks of it like a purified form of natural chakra: the essence of the life force itself, without dilution or flavor. He doesn’t think that’s exactly accurate, but it’s what helped him visualize it in the beginning and the image has stuck.

A bead of white light forms in Iruka’s hand, growing steadily until it’s the size of his thumbnail, filling up the cracks and crevices in the script of the seal. He doesn’t look up, brow furrowing as he keeps concentration on the chakra and waits for the next step. 

“Imagine the yang chakra growing and rising from your hand, as if a fountain beginning to overflow, pushing at the boundaries of the barrier.” 

That’s harder, but it’s not as complicated as real form manipulation would be. He doesn’t have to give the chakra spin or direction. It just means he has to gather it differently, pull more from inside of himself, and push it into a pre-made form. Iruka’s brows furrow as he struggles, closing his eyes to keep the image more clearly in his mind. 

“Good. Now, listen to me carefully, Iruka-kun.” The Sandaime’s voice is soft but clear. “This is the most difficult aspect. While you keep your chakra flowing, convalescing in your palm… You must break both seals at once. Break them—do not allow them to dissipate.”

Iruka almost loses his focus while listening, his mind working too fast, but he manages to save the chakra before it wobbles. Breaking a seal requires a concentrated effort, a sudden surge of chakra rather than the gradual absence of it. The tricky part in breaking a seal is keeping from overpowering it, which can cause far more harm than good, especially for a seal with kinetic effects such as the Finger-Carving Seal. And breaking two seals at once? It’s a balancing act similar to walking a trapeze.

But Iruka can do it. He’s practiced this for months, and while he’s never done it on a seal with this much chakra embedded in it, he knows he can. He just hopes he doesn’t lose a thumb in the process. This is the Sandaime, though, and if he has confidence in Iruka, then Iruka knows he can do it.

So he does. 

The seals don’t make any sound as they break, but Iruka thinks they should because he can feel it in his bones. It vibrates across his skin, tingling like static, and fills his vision with white lights that spark like fireworks. For a moment, he can’t see anything but the beautiful flares as they cascade in a circle around him, falling towards the ground slowly, like a feather drifting down. Then he realizes that he can’t see the rest of the room because his eyes are still closed. 

He wants to open them, to ask why he can see the fireworks behind his eyelids, but then he notices something. They don’t fall in a perfect circle. There’s one spot that’s different, where the fireworks disappear, fading into non-existence. No, not fading. It’s more like they’re being sucked in to something, leaving a hollow space in their wake. After a moment, the sparks and the vibrations in his skin fade and Iruka slowly opens his eyes. The Sandaime is looking at him, a smile curving around his pipe. His eyes are crinkled at the corners and he chuckles. 

He looks proud. 

Iruka’s chest feels full to bursting. He leaps from his seat and punches his hand in the air, letting out a loud whoop of celebration. “That was awesome!” He laughs, holding his hand up just to make sure there aren’t any marks. Only the scar he had gotten when he fell into that sink hole. “But, uh… what did I do?”

“You, my boy, have become a sensor.” The Sandaime beams indulgently. “As you’ve learned, yang chakra is the essence of all life. Every creature has it, whether or not they can consciously release it. Each individual’s chakra is also unique, elemental nature being just one aspect of many. By layering a three-point barrier seal around an even, two-point carving seal, you caused an unstable reaction. Then, by suddenly breaking both seals at once, you dispersed your chakra into your surroundings in a manner similar to manipulating chakra shape. As your yang chakra comes into contact with other life forces, it is naturally transformed and repelled by them.”

“So that’s how my mom always found me?” Iruka bites his lip. He’s still happy, still excited to have come one step closer to his parents, but it doesn’t seem quite right. “But I never noticed her doing anything. I didn’t see her form seals or her hand glow, or…”

“You wouldn’t have. Firstly, the actual seal your mother used is slightly different, essentially a combination of the techniques you just learned with an additional protection that conceals the visible effects of the chakra. Now that you have the basics, however, you will master that seal with little effort. Secondly, your mother was extremely proficient in chakra control, and she had been trained in these techniques even before arriving in Konoha. She was capable of molding her chakra and creating seals with the ease of breathing.” The Sandaime clasps his hands together in his lap. “Her naturally large reserve of chakra also allowed her to use the technique repeatedly and over much larger areas than most shinobi would find possible.” 

Iruka deflates. So he _hasn’t_ done it. Not really, not the way that his mother did. Iruka knows he doesn’t have a particularly large amount of chakra compared to most of his classmates. He wonders if it’s even possible for him to use the technique in the same way his mom had. But something else comes to his mind. “So, you couldn’t see the sparks?” He asks as he sits back on his chair, hand coming up to rub at the scar over his nose, a nervous tick he’s developed when he’s feeling anxious. 

“Sparks?” The Sandaime takes a moment to consider that, puffing on his pipe. “No. Yang release is more subtle than the elemental chakra natures, and is tied deeply to the individual themself. I believe that only the user can feel subtle, nuanced shifts in their own yang. It might even be that your chakra will react to different sources of yang in different ways. However, the build of chakra used to break the seals might very well be detectable by some with innate sensory abilities, and would certainly be visible to the byakugan or sharingan.”

Iruka chews on the corner of his lip, bringing his knee up to his chest and wrapping his arms around it while he thinks. “So… is it even useful in battle?” He’s starting to doubt whether this is as amazing and life-changing as he expected it to be. He wanted to learn it to get closer to his mom, of course, but Iruka had also been thinking of it like a… specialty. A clan jutsu that could help define him. Make him unique, a better shinobi. Right now, he’s disappointed. 

“Only you can determine that, Iruka-kun.” The Sandaime says kindly. “You are a bright, creative young man. If you put your mind to it, I am certain you can find ways to apply this that will assist you. After all, you are the notorious prankster of Konoha who has come up with no less than twenty-two excellent uses for pond scum—I don’t believe utilizing advanced Fūinjutsu should be too difficult by comparison.”

Iruka starts practicing the technique whenever he can, but it’s slow going. It takes him weeks just to expand his five-foot radius to a mere ten-feet, and even that is nowhere near what his mother could do. It is enough, though, for Iruka to learn a few things. First of all, his yang chakra passes through inanimate objects as if they aren’t even there. Walls, windows, tables, and benches are all essentially incorporeal as far as the yang chakra is concerned. Also, living plants can affect it, but in a different way than animals or people. Trees and grass seem to be impervious to the yang, but they don’t have the strength of chakra needed to repel or destroy it. Instead, the sparks just sort of sit on the leaves or bark for a few seconds, forming a clear outline, before falling away. 

Normal animals, like stray dogs and cats and even insects, have enough chakra to repel the droplets, bouncing them back towards Iruka. This makes it harder to tell their exact size and shape, but he finds that it’s easier the closer they are to him. The chakra doesn’t shoot out like a ray, originating from Iruka and sweeping the area, but rather glides down from above. Meaning that, as long as the creatures are within his sphere of influence, he can feel chakra around and behind them, giving him a better clue as to what they are. 

Iruka only does the technique in his classroom once, and he quickly realizes it’s a mistake. Inuzuka Nao’s dog, Katashi, raises his head and sniffs, yellow eyes wide, and turns his head to stare straight at Iruka. Iruka feels his heart hammering in his chest, his breath seizing in his throat, and suddenly he’s _terrified_ of being exposed. He meets Katashi’s stare with wide eyes and shakes his head very slightly, silently begging the canine not to say (bark?) anything. Katashi tilts his head, flicks his tail once, and then turns back towards the teacher. Iruka waits for a few moments, a cold sweat breaking out on his back, but Katashi just lays his chin down on his paws and goes to sleep.

It occurs to Iruka later that he has no reason to hide it, wouldn’t get in trouble for using the jutsu. Heck, Jitsuko probably would have had a stroke with happiness that Iruka had actually learned something in the last year (although it hadn’t been from her). But he doesn’t want anyone to know, and he doesn’t do it again. Not until graduation, and then Iruka’s busy trying to pass his final genin test without leaving Mizuki behind. 

All in all, it’s a few months before Iruka makes any real progress. 

He still meets with the Sandaime at least every other week, although they spend more time talking about random things like tea and dogs than they do his mother’s jutsu. He still goes to the memorial stone, and sometimes he still sleeps there. He still cries. There’s still a horrible, sucking wound in his chest every time he tries to fall asleep in his cold bed in his quiet apartment, eating dry chicken with no seasoning, or when he comes back from a stupid mission and realizes he has no one to complain to, no one to run the bath for him or hug him.

But he’s an adult now. He’s a real shinobi. 

He thinks his parents would be proud.

A year passes and Iruka’s about to embark on his first C-rank mission. He feels nervous anticipation curl in his stomach, and when he goes to the memorial stone that morning, it’s to ask his parents to wish him good luck.

But, for the first time in ages, someone else is there.

Iruka thinks they might be dead.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this chapter might be a little long but, hey, first interaction with the ANBU! I hope you all enjoy!

The air is still cool at this time in the morning, untouched by the warmth of the sun that’s only barely started to peek above the horizon. Birds chirp, the only other inhabitants of Konoha awake at this early hour. Well, them and Iruka’s team, which will be meeting him at the gates in forty minutes. Iruka doesn’t have long, but that’s alright. He just wants to tell his parents, wants them to know that he’s finally doing something important, something worthwhile. 

Just in case he doesn’t make it back.

Not that he thinks this mission will be particularly difficult. He’s still just a genin, and since the war has been over for several years, that means he’s mostly been relegated to finding lost animals and repairing fences. Mizuki complains incessantly, wanting to know when he’ll get the chance to “prove himself.” Iruka’s bored, too, but he takes what he thinks of as a slightly more reasonable approach. He has no distinct desire to go exploring foreign lands and rescue damsels in distress, anyway. If they stay close to Konoha, they stay close to the memorial stone.

Iruka knows his mother won’t find him there. He does. He’s an adult now, for all intents and purposes, and he’s long since moved past childish denial. But that doesn’t change that he misses his parents, that he wants to remember them because no one else does. When he stays away for too long it starts to feel like all of his emotions bottle up inside him, fizzing like a carbonated drink, bubbling and frothing until he’s fit to burst. When he’s at the stone, he can let all of those emotions out, pulling off the cap and letting it overflow safely in a place where no one can think less of him for it. 

This next mission will be different. Not life threatening, perhaps, but at least they’ll be leaving the village. He doesn’t want to mess this up, wants to prove that he can be a real shinobi, like his parents. Even if it’s just protecting a traveling merchant from petty thieves who don’t even know the word “chakra.” 

He doesn’t expect there to be anyone at the memorial stone this early in the morning, when the stars have barely faded. But as he approaches he sees a form, gray and black with a long sword strapped across their body. Iruka cautiously approaches, not wanting to interrupt someone’s mourning but also knowing he doesn’t have time to wait for them to leave. 

When he’s about twenty feet away, he notices the edges of white porcelain framing wild silver locks. He stops abruptly. A potent combination of fear and concern twists his stomach like nausea, because ANBU aren’t seen unless they want to be, and yet this one is still as death, kneeling before the memorial stone. Iruka’s pack slides from his arm and drops heavily to the grass. The ANBU doesn’t flinch.

The latest name was added several months before. Iruka can’t imagine what’s so vital about mourning at this time that an ANBU would allow a mere genin to see them. Perhaps he should just leave, turn around and say his goodbyes to his parents in the sanctity of his own mind, but he can’t bring himself to move. The ANBU is like a statue, and Iruka can’t even make out if they’re breathing. 

His throat is dry, but he forces air through it to speak. “ANBU-san?”

It’s like pulling the cord on a puppet. The ANBU springs to life, whirling so fast that Iruka can’t even stumble away from the gray blur. Iruka had been half-afraid he was talking to a corpse, but now the ANBU is the essence of life, vitality breathed into his muscles along with a burst of deadly intent. 

Iruka’s heart stills and then hammers madly. He wants to turn, to run, but he knows it wouldn’t make any difference. Iruka’s not slow, but he can’t even register the movement before the ANBU has his hand on the hilt of his kunai. 

Just as suddenly as it began, the motion ends and the ANBU becomes a statue once more. The killing intent abruptly drops off, leaving the air thick and heavy with tension in its wake. His mask is white with stark red lines curving around the eyes and on either cheek. Small, pointed ears give the impression of a predatory mammal—perhaps a dog, or a jackal. The eyes appear to be sunken, encased with shadows, and Iruka can see nothing but black in their depths. They unnerve him. He looks away, eyes flicking down to where the ANBU’s gloved fingers flex around the hilt of his weapon, but he doesn’t draw it to attack.

“I…” The words “I’m sorry” peter out and die on Iruka’s lips when his eyes runs down the ANBU’s form to rest on the single splash of color apart from that dreaded mask. Crimson blood seeps through the ANBU’s glove, soaking into the bone-white brace on his forearm. Iruka swallows forcefully. “You’re bleeding.” 

It’s a stupid thing to say, a statement of the obvious. The ANBU either already knows or he doesn’t care. Iruka gets the impression of the latter as the ANBU finally comes to life once more, movements stiff and jerky, as if every motion takes an incredible force of will. He (and Iruka is certain it’s a man, from the musculature of the shoulders, long limbs, and narrow hips) releases the kunai and drops back to the ground, resting his weight against the memorial stone. The sword must be digging into his back uncomfortably where it’s pressed between stone and flesh. The ANBU flips open a pouch and pulls out a pad of gauze, pressing it to the wound still seeping blood from his arm. 

The action jogs Iruka’s brain, urging him to speak now that the immediate threat to his person seems to have passed. The mask is still turned towards him, watching, but Iruka gets the feeling he’s no longer considered a threat. 

“I can help.” Iruka offers, taking a tentative step forward, hand rising slowly so as not to make any sudden moves. He feels like he’s offering to help a wild beast, a wounded mountain lion that might snap at any moment. 

His chakra control is excellent, the best in his team, even if he doesn’t have a lot of it to spare. There isn’t a medic in his unit, but their jounin-sensei has been teaching Iruka the basics of healing chakra. He can’t do anything complicated, and he’s only really practiced on himself and his sensei thus far, but he feels the need to do _something_. Iruka has a feeling that, if the ANBU were capable of staying the bleeding by himself, he already would have. 

The ANBU hasn’t said anything or made to move away, so Iruka takes that as acceptance. He’s overly conscious of the distance between them even as he gradually closes it. He takes a few more steps and sinks to his knees before the ANBU. “I’m not a medic, but I can seal this for you until you get to the hospital.”

The ANBU is cold and unmoving as marble. He doesn’t so much as twitch as Iruka reaches out and slowly, carefully, pulls his uninjured hand away so Iruka can cradle the injured arm and examine the wound. He keeps his head down, focusing on what must have been a slash from a deadly-sharp blade. 

He can feel the ANBU’s intent stare piercing him, even if he can’t see it. 

He’s no longer concerned about being attacked. First of all, there’s nothing he can do about if the ANBU _does_ attack. Iruka likes to think he’s not useless, but he’s also not as foolhardy as Mizuki; he knows when he’s desperately outclassed. Secondly, this is a Konoha shinobi, ANBU or not, and Iruka trusts his comrades. Finally, if the ANBU wanted to kill him, Iruka would have been dead long before he got close enough to touch.

When Iruka pulls the gauze off and the ANBU still makes no move to push him away, he feels safe enough to fumble in one of his own pouches, pulling out a small bottle of wound cleaner. “This’ll sting.” He murmurs, flicking open the cap of the cleaner with his thumb. It has a potent smell, chemical and unpleasant, but Iruka’s used to it. Healing chakra can’t do everything, and even if Iruka was a medic, he would still need to sterilize the wound. He remembers his jounin-sensei emphasizing the dangers of sealing a wound around embedded particles, that the resulting infections can kill a person. Iruka repeats his sensei’s words in his head like a mantra, forcing him through the necessary steps. It helps to calm his frazzled nerves. 

The ANBU’s fingers twitch when Iruka pours the dark brown liquid over the wound, an involuntary muscular reaction, but he makes no sound. His breathing doesn’t even so much as hitch. In fact, Iruka can hardly hear him breathe at all, can’t see the rise and fall of his chest under the armored vest. Iruka dabs at the excess liquid with the gauze and then sets it to the side, bringing his hand back to hover just a half-inch above the ANBU’s skin. He inhales deeply and holds the breath for a few seconds, focusing his chakra to the palm of his hand and then extending it past the limits of his skin until it brushes against the wound. 

This healing technique is advanced, the most difficult thing his sensei has taught him thus far, and he’s only just gotten proficient enough at it to be really useful. The careful balance of yin and yang chakra is extremely difficult, but learning yang release under the Sandaime has given Iruka an advantage. Apparently he still has a way to go, because the ANBU makes his first noise in the form of a sharp hiss of pain. The muscles in his legs tense, knees drawing up slightly. 

Iruka winces, altering the amount of chakra he’s outputting, reigning it in as much as he can. “Sorry,” he apologizes, cheeks growing warm in embarrassment as he glances up to check if the ANBU is still in pain. The cold mask shows him nothing and he quickly looks away again, lips pinching and tugging down into a frown as he concentrates on his work.

Most often, Iruka just heals himself. That’s both much faster and more taxing than healing another person. When applying healing chakra to his own body, he doesn’t have to worry about using too much at once because his chakra won’t work against itself. Repairing someone else is a different story entirely, and it’s easy to forget that most people’s chakra doesn’t play too well with others. He knows he’s a long way from being able to heal people as seamlessly as a real medic-nin.

But ANBU are some of the strongest shinobi in the village, and Iruka really hates to show his incompetence in front of one. He redoubles his efforts. 

After a few minutes, a scab forms over the wound, sealing it off and stemming the blood flow. Still Iruka works, until the ANBU’s hand shoots out to grab his wrist and Iruka jumps like a scared rabbit. His healing chakra peters out and he watches, heart in his throat, as the ANBU moves his hand away. He releases it and Iruka lets it drop down to rest on his thigh. He sits back, rubbing at his scar in a nervous tick as the ANBU tests the healing. 

“I guess that’s enough, then?” He asks, then hesitates a moment before realizing he’s too close for the ANBU to easily stand. Iruka hurriedly rises, taking several steps back until he’s at a reasonable distance. 

It feels strange to be talking for both of them. He doesn’t know if the ANBU can’t speak or if he simply chooses not to. He considers that the ANBU is afraid of giving away his identity, but that doesn’t make much sense because Iruka’s certain he’s never met anyone with hair like that, even out of uniform. It’s silver like Mizuki’s, but short and rakish, standing up and flying in every direction like he’s been hit with a bolt of lightning. 

The ANBU isn’t quite as swift at standing. He braces his right hand on the stone and uses it to pull himself up, pops and creaks following him as he rises stiffly. Iruka wonders where all the ANBU is hurt, but he’s certain it isn’t his place to ask. If the ANBU wanted more of Iruka’s help, he would have indicated it. He watches in silence as the ANBU straightens fully and takes an uneven step forward.

Iruka has been thinking of the ANBU as an adult, maybe in his late twenties, but he reevaluates that assumption when the man draws level with him. He’s several inches taller than Iruka, but slender, his shoulders still narrow. The only part of him laid bare are his biceps. The skin there is pale, smooth and unblemished other than the red curl of the ANBU tattoo on his left shoulder. Black fabric covers his throat and disappears under the rim of the mask, but his neck is thin, almost graceful. His muscles are lean and corded, and remind Iruka more of a teenager than a full-grown man.

Suddenly Iruka feels nausea grip his stomach, because he knows what the ANBU do, what they are. All shinobi have to kill eventually or be killed themselves. It’s the way of their world. But Iruka’s still young, just a genin, hasn’t even drawn the blood of the enemy. And this boy may not be much older, but he’s already seen so much, already forged himself into sharp steel made for slicing throats and severing tendons. Iruka looks at the ANBU, into the abyss in the holes of the mask where the eyes should be, and he knows that the ANBU has killed more men than Iruka has even faced in combat. 

He feels sick, but not afraid.

When the shinobi’s hand falls on his shoulder, Iruka doesn’t flinch. He feels _compassion_ , because he can’t begin to understand what that sort of life must be like, and he doesn’t want to. Mizuki and the others talk about the ANBU like they’re a thing to aspire to, almost like celebrities. They brag as if they themselves might someday be good enough to grace their elite forces. Iruka knows better. He knows that he isn’t that talented, but even if he were, he wouldn’t want to do it. He wouldn’t want to live behind a mask, with blood seeping through his sleeves, and only able to thank someone with a pat on the shoulder. 

But still, Iruka is being thanked. He can feel it, even if it isn’t put into words. So he smiles, and he tries his best to convey that he understands. Oh, he doesn’t understand what the ANBU has _gone_ through, even if he knows intellectually—but he understands that, right now, the ANBU is just a human, just a shinobi like Iruka. Not someone to be put on a pedestal or admired. He’s just a human thanking another, and the weight of his hand is comforting on Iruka’s skin. It feels like his father’s praise, or his mother’s tight hugs, or the Sandaime’s embrace in this very spot when Iruka was eleven years old. 

It feels like acceptance. 

Iruka smiles and the ANBU is gone, a swirl of leaves taking his place. Iruka stands there for a long time, and he imagines he can still feel the weight of that palm on his shoulder. Then he pulls on his pack, grabs the soiled gauze to dispose of on his way towards the gates, and closes his eyes before the memorial stone. 

This time, he doesn’t cry. He says goodbye to his parents and asks for their guidance on his mission. He tells them that he misses them.

He starts to pull away, but pauses. He turns back and trails his fingers on the stone. sparing a thought for the ANBU and whichever name and face he mourned.

Later, Iruka realizes that this day marks the very first time he has ever smiled at the memorial stone. 

Iruka thinks about that ANBU many times after that. He wonders why the ANBU hadn’t gone to the medics straight away after returning from his mission. Maybe he’s like Iruka, someone who still mourns even years later. He wonders if the ANBU comes there out of uniform, and if Iruka would recognize him if he did. Not that it would matter either way.

He doesn’t get the chance to practice his mother’s jutsu as much as he would like, but he is getting better at it, gradually expanding his range and learning through experience the subtle differences in how other people’s chakra interacts with his. 

While the Sandaime almost seems to absorb Iruka’s chakra, it slides off of Mizuki like water on oil. Yuno, the other member of Iruka’s team, makes the fireworks tremble and evaporate. Iruka learns that Yuno’s chakra nature is fire, and he wonders if that’s why. Their jounin-sensei, Daichi, has an earth nature, and he makes the sparks turn heavy and fall to the ground when they touch his skin. 

Anko, Kotetsu, and Izumo are a trio about two years older than Iruka. They form Zenta-sensei’s team, and though Anko’s already made it to chuunin, she isn’t stuck up about it. Zenta is friends with Daichi, so they all train together sometimes. They’re fun, and Iruka finds himself hanging out with them a lot when neither group is on missions. Anko doesn’t seem to like Mizuki, but Mizuki doesn’t like her either, so Iruka doesn’t pay them much attention. 

Anko makes Iruka’s chakra pop and sizzle, like water meeting a hot skillet, whereas they cling to Kotetsu for several seconds before dissipating. Izumo almost seems to blow them away, the sparks moving in lazy swirls around him as they descend.

None of them don’t know that Iruka’s studying them, of course. Daichi has vaguely heard about Iruka’s ability, but it’s still not useful in the field, so they don’t talk about it. Iruka just keeps practicing. 

He likes to show his parent’s how far he’s come. Sometimes he feels embarrassed because he knows his mother would be doing it better, but he also knows they would praise him just for trying. So he spends a lot of his time practicing when he’s in front of the memorial stone, sensing the squirrels, birds, and large insects that surround him. One time his chakra reveals a snake and Iruka nearly has a heart attack before he realizes it’s just a harmless garter snake. Oddly large, but it doesn't have enough chakra to be a summons, so Iruka gets out of its way so it can pass. Anko and Mizuki love snakes (Iruka wonders why they don’t bond over that), but while Iruka isn’t normally scared of them, he likes dogs and cats better.

On his fourth visit to the memorial stone after coming back from his C-rank mission, Iruka shows his mom and dad how far he can spread his chakra. He closes his eyes and focuses on the palm of his hand, filling up the seal with energy. He’s faster at it now, and he has enough control with his mother’s seal that the white glow of his chakra isn’t even visible. He’s pretty proud of that.

When he breaks the seal and the chakra disperses, he can feel it going farther than ever. Into the tree line, bouncing off of plants and leaves, sailing past dead trunks and stones, leaving empty spaces around two squirrels, a bird in her nest, a person, a raccoon or possum, and--

Iruka’s eyes fly open and his heart starts to beat double-time. _A person_. Iruka can’t see anything past the leaves and bushes, but he’s certain of it. Why is someone hiding in the trees? Are they watching him? Is it an enemy? Do they know he sensed them?

Iruka lets his hand drift closer to his kunai, pretending as though he’s plucking at blades of grass on the ground, and he waits. Nothing happens. No one announces their presence, and without the use of the Fūinjutsu, Iruka can’t tell if anyone is there at all. He starts to think maybe he was mistaken. Heart in his throat, he builds up the chakra in his hand one more time, just to make sure. Just to prove himself wrong. 

This time, Iruka pays attention only to that single spot in front of him, about a hundred yards into the forest. It’s on the very edge of Iruka’s sphere, and it takes way too much of his chakra to even stretch that far. He won’t be able to do it again without exhausting himself.

But he sees it. Feels it. His chakra zings, fizzing and shuddering before popping out of existence. It reminds Iruka of an electrical shock, like lightning on his skin. It’s a more subtle reaction than with most, like the person is deliberately holding in their chakra, concealing themselves, but Iruka can still sense it. The outline of a person sitting on a tree branch, one foot propped up on it while the other dangles beneath. Iruka can’t tell what way their head is turned, or anything about what they look like other than that it’s not a child. And there’s a long scroll on their back, or maybe a stick, or maybe--

A sword. 

Iruka tries to think of all the shinobi he knows that carry swords on their backs. There aren’t many. 

Other than the ANBU.

When Iruka’s chakra disappears, so does the outline of the person, and Iruka is again completely unable to sense that anything is amiss. 

Yeah, probably ANBU.

It could be any of them, Iruka reflects as he shakily stands and makes his way back home. He doesn’t think he’s followed. When he gets to his apartment he sends out another burst, but he only feels the neighbors that normally surround him. ANBU are secretive by nature, and there are surely dozens or even hundreds that Iruka has never seen before. It doesn’t have to be the one that Iruka healed. 

But as he lays in bed that night and thinks of his chakra’s reaction, the buzz in his skin, he also thinks of wild silver locks and a warm hand on his shoulder. 

The next time Iruka goes to the memorial stone, he senses nothing. He stays for a while, but his thoughts aren’t with his parents as much as they usually are. When he does his third burst and finds no one, he finally leaves.

The second time he returns, the ANBU is back. He doesn’t move the entire time Iruka is there. Iruka sits quietly, knees pulled up to his chest, heart beating quickly in his ribcage. He’s being watched, he knows it, and maybe he should be scared or angry or maybe he should just go home. The ANBU probably wants to be alone, after all, has to be there to mourn the dead. But the ANBU doesn’t leave, even though Iruka waits for two hours.

The third time he goes, he’s so furious he can barely think. He checks to see if the ANBU is there, and when they aren’t, he unleashes a tirade. 

“He could have gotten us killed!” Iruka snarls, plucking a ridge off of a pinecone and throwing it into the forest, because it’s less destructive than what he really wants to do. “Mizuki, with his big freakin’ mouth--all he cares about is _recognition_. Who cares about that? What does it matter who knows your name if you aren’t actually _alive_ to use it?” The words keep coming, an endless spiel steeped in frustration, for so long that Iruka’s throat starts to hurt. He’s breathing heavily even though he isn’t moving, and the edges of his fingers hurt from digging into the pinecone. He throws it at a random tree, a little bit of chakra behind the act, and it bursts into splinters when it hits the bark. Iruka pulls his knees up and crosses his arms over them, hands forming into fists. 

His voice is softer now, thick with the tears that he’s holding back. Not the tears he normally has at the memorial stone. Not cold ones that freeze on his cheeks. These are hot like lava and he swipes at them as they trickle down his face. “Who cares about being the best shinobi, if you can’t protect people?” He finally pauses, taking deep breaths to try to force down the sobs that are threatening to burst forth. He bites his lip to keep them in.

Mizuki has been his best friend for as long as he can remember, and he doesn’t want that to change. Mizuki was there for him when Iruka’s parents died, and he was there after. His presence was comforting, even if it wasn’t exactly what Iruka always needed. That sort of friendship means something to Iruka. He can’t give it up so easily. 

But sometimes, he really questions why he bothers.

Iruka knows his parents can’t really hear him. He’s not sure what the Pure Land is like, but he’s pretty sure dead people don’t get to watch the living. And if they can, it probably doesn’t matter where he is, they’ll always see him anyway. But it normally makes him feel better to come here, to talk to them like they’re listening. 

Right now it doesn’t. He feels as far away from his parents as ever, because they would have known what to do. They would have been able to stop things before Daichi had to get injured to save their lives. They wouldn’t have been so weak, so helpless. 

Iruka is weak. But even worse than that, he’s alone. 

He builds chakra in the palm of his hand. The familiar sensation thrums in his skin, a buzz of energy waiting to be released. It’s not as good as his mother would have done it. It’s not as strong, or as stable, or as easy, for Iruka. _He’s_ not as strong. But, as he releases his life force into the air, watches it flutter and scatter around him, he feels a little like he’s releasing some of his own despair. 

Until he feels the zing of lightning electrify the air and Iruka looks up towards the forest, where his chakra is being taken over by the ANBU. 

A flash of anger spreads in a wildfire in Iruka’s gut. He wants to call the ANBU out, to ask why the hell he thinks it’s ok to watch people cry, why he can’t just leave Iruka _alone_ like everyone else does.

But the rage sweeps through him as quickly as it came, dissipating along with his chakra. Iruka buries his face in his knees and the sobs finally break free, sniffles and broken gasps rending the clearing. He knows he’s being watched, knows he _should_ be ashamed that someone who strong, so powerful and capable, is watching him cry like a baby. But he’s beyond caring, and if the ANBU is going to look down on him for it, then fine. 

It’s not like Iruka will ever be his equal, anyway. 

It takes a long time for the tears to ebb. Maybe hours. Iruka doesn’t raise his head until his eyes are so puffy that his tear ducts are swollen shut. He wipes his face with his sleeve and looks up at the trees. He’s sure the ANBU is gone, wouldn’t have stuck around to watch a kid cry. But when he gathers his chakra and releases it, the ANBU is still there. He’s reclining on his branch now, cross-legged and facing Iruka. 

Iruka doesn’t understand it. He doesn’t get what the ANBU is doing there, doesn’t know why he won’t leave, or just run Iruka off so he can have the stone to himself. But it occurs to Iruka, at that moment, that he isn’t alone. 

Not literally. 

He recalls the weight of the ANBU’s hand on his shoulder, and he thinks that maybe the literal is what’s important.

Over the next few visits, Iruka starts talking more and more. He initially justifies it as talking to his parents, but when the ANBU never leaves, never gives any indication he wants Iruka to stop, his thoughts start to change and he directs his words towards more than the dead. 

It’s kind of nice to have someone listen.

A few years go by and Iruka passes his chuunin exam. The first person he tells is his ANBU. He doesn’t know when “ _the_ ANBU” switched to “ _his_ ANBU”. Maybe around the time he started hoping the ANBU was there and feeling disappointment when he wasn’t. 

Iruka only gets to lead a few B-rank missions before the Sandaime asks him to help at the academy, at least temporarily. Iruka recognizes the need; between the baby boom after the war finally coming of age to enter the academy, the teachers that died during the Kyuubi attack or previous war, and the fact that said war being over means children are actually staying until they’re twelve rather than being pushed out to die as soon as they’re ready to hold a kunai… it all means that enrollment in the academy is higher than ever, the teachers stretched thin. But Iruka doesn’t think he is the best person to help.

The Sandaime tells Iruka that he has confidence in him, that there are more ways to help people than by fighting, and Iruka doesn’t know what to say to that. He knows it isn’t an order, knows that the Sandaime respects Iruka enough to find someone else if Iruka truly refuses, but he doesn’t want to disappoint the old man who’s the closest thing to family Iruka has left. Well, apart from a stranger whose face he’s never seen.

He fills in for another teacher, students that are almost ready to graduate and don’t need much of his help, but he tries anyway. He’s a little out of his league, but he does his best. He tells his parents and his mysterious ANBU about it, about how the kids are little brats (just like he was), but they’re not bad. Not really.

He doesn’t tell them about the small, weak part of him that’s relieved he no longer has to be the one to watch his comrades die.

It’s not uncommon for his ANBU to disappear for a few weeks at a time. Iruka would have been surprised if he didn’t, considering he knows the man’s profession. But one day, while Iruka’s sweeping dead leaves away from the memorial stone, he realizes that he hasn’t seen the ANBU since they first started falling.

Iruka goes back to the stone the next day. And the next. It takes two months for his ANBU to return, longer than any other absence to date, but he _does_ return. 

Snow carpets the ground, seeping into Iruka’s boots as he slogs forward. It’s the day before the Rinne festival. Iruka has plans to celebrate with the other chuunin tomorrow, knows he won’t be able to get out of the party Izumo and Kotetsu are throwing, so he’s coming to the memorial stone to pay respects to his parents now. It’s not quite sunset, but he isn’t worried about running into other mourners. The snow is too thick and the frigid wind too cold for most people to bother. Even huddled up in a jacket and scarf, Iruka’s shoulders are hunched forward in a desperate bid for warmth. 

When Iruka first sees the stone, he thinks someone has dropped something in front of it. There’s dark spots on the ground before the stone but no footprints leading to it. Iruka trudges closer, squinting to see through the snow flurries. 

Not footprints, but some sort of impression. Maybe… from someone kneeling?

Before he can think twice, Iruka’s forming chakra in his hand, the yang energy suffusing his skin with warmth. He gathers as much as he can, releases it, and waits with bated breath as it falls. 

His heart skips a beat and a smile stretches his cheeks when his chakra outlines a figure in the trees. In _his ANBU’s_ tree. His mission must have been over. Only one thing was different: his ANBU was standing rather than sitting. Iruka looks down at the imprints in the snow and the pieces click together. He’s interrupted his ANBU for once rather than the other way around. 

Iruka doesn’t want to intrude, knows what it’s like to need time alone with the dead. So he just says one simple phrase, the words spilling from his lips before he can think twice. “Welcome back.” 

He’s still smiling when he heads back to his empty apartment. 

That night, while Iruka’s bundled up at his kotatsu with the gray blanket, sipping tea and grading papers, he thinks of the ANBU waiting out there in the snow, kneeling in it despite the cold. He thinks of the mysterious stranger who had gifted him a scratchy standard-issue blanket that smelled like dust and soy sauce and was covered in animal fur. 

Maybe he’s wrong. Maybe it was someone else who gave Iruka the blanket. Maybe it doesn’t matter. All Iruka knows is that he wants his ANBU to be warm, and to give to someone else a little of what he’s received.

Comfort. 

The memorial stone is vacant when he returns that night, stomping through snow and slush, his thighs burning with the effort. He doesn’t stay long. He drapes the blanket over the tree branch (and if Iruka hadn’t been certain which one it was before, he’s fairly confident the only one with bootprints and finger-shaped smudges on the branch above is a decent choice) and hurries home before his nose freezes off. 

When he returns the next day, just before the Rinne party begins, the blanket is gone. For some reason, that makes Iruka feel as warm as the blanket always had.

Iruka thinks he’ll always remember the day that his ANBU first tries to comfort him. It isn’t much, he supposes, not in the grand scheme of things. Iruka’s been talking to him every time their visits coincide, rambling about his students and his friends and anything he can. He knows the ANBU may not care, knows he may just be an irritating nuisance, but Iruka’s long since decided that probably isn’t the case. His ANBU isn’t a captive audience, could leave if he wanted. Yet he never _once_ leaves the memorial stone first. That, along with the missing blanket, gives Iruka hope. 

That day, Iruka is happy, elation bubbling in his chest and making him light as a feather. “They’re going to give me a class of my own.” Iruka smiles as he works to clear weeds away from the memorial stone. It’s warm and life is springing up all over the village, something that Iruka loves to see. He’s always preferred the hotter months. “I’m nervous, but… She said I’m ready. I don’t know if that’s true, but I’ll guess we’ll see, yeah? Kotetsu and Izumo want to go to the Sharpened Kunai tonight to celebrate.” 

Iruka sits back and rubs his scar, hoping he doesn’t sound too full of himself. It’s hard not to feel proud. He knows this is a great honor, that not just everyone is trusted with teaching the cherished buds of Konoha’s future. More than that, it makes him feel hope; hope that he can make a difference in someone’s life, even if he isn’t out there risking his own.

“I told Mizuki, but he--” Iruka cuts himself off, biting his tongue before he can continue. He’d told himself he wouldn’t do this, wouldn’t let himself focus on it, at least not while he was with his ANBU. “They’re not giving him a class of his own yet.” 

It shouldn’t bother Iruka as much as it does, how Mizuki reacted when Iruka told him, the cold steel in his stare as he sneered about “precious Iruka” who had the Sandaime under his thumb.

Iruka knows that Mizuki is struggling. He didn’t choose to become a teacher, not even in the questionable way that Iruka did. He was pulled off of active duty, and although Iruka isn’t quite sure what happened, he knows that Mizuki was forced into this. He also knows that Mizuki has always had self-esteem issues, always needed to be praised, to be admired, to be the best person in any room. So Iruka understands his friend is less than thrilled that he isn’t being given the same status upgrade that Iruka is. 

But sometimes he just really wants to punch Mizuki, quite hard, in the face. Maybe off of the Hokage heads so he has a few hundred foot drop and rocky ground at the bottom.

Really, his anger is a cover. Iruka hurts. He feels betrayed, and he feels Mizuki slipping away from him, growing more distant every day. Iruka respects that Mizuki has a girlfriend now, and it’s not like Iruka doesn’t have other friends. But none of them have been with him from the very beginning. None of them pulled Iruka out of his darkest thoughts, banging pots and pans and shouting across the apartment until he got out of bed. 

Mizuki’s only known his girlfriend for a month, and yet she’s already more important than Iruka. She doesn’t get Mizuki’s ire, his bitterness, his resentment. Mizuki hadn’t reacted with jealousy when _she_ became a chuunin. 

Iruka gets Mizuki’s worst, while she gets his time and his affection.

Iruka doesn’t love Mizuki romantically. He’s pretty sure about that, even if he has realized that he’s more attracted to men with long, light hair than he is to pretty brunette girls. He doesn’t want to date Mizuki, even if Mizuki _was_ interested in guys. Hell, he’d probably end up killing the bastard within a few weeks if they ever tried to live together.

He loves Mizuki as a friend, as the person who was most important to him for so long after his parents died. 

It stings that Iruka doesn’t mean that much to Mizuki.

A change occurs in Iruka’s surroundings, and for a moment he thinks something must be brushing against him, but it isn’t physical. It’s a subtle caress of chakra, so small that Iruka wouldn’t have even noticed it except that it touches his own and tingles against his skin like a static shock. 

It feels like comfort, and Iruka accepts it like a dying man does a priest. He relaxes his hand from a fist and breathes a sigh, wishing he could expel every thought of Mizuki along with it.

Even if he didn’t have Mizuki, Iruka did have someone. “Thank you, ANBU-san.”

In Iruka’s class, he sees children who are hurting. Children who are in pain, who have lost their families, their purpose. He sees one little boy with blonde hair who carries the weight of the world inside of him. And Iruka hears what others say, knows that Uzumaki Naruto is the host of the Kyuubi. But all he sees is a little boy who desperately wants to be seen, to be heard, to be loved. 

In Naruto, Iruka sees himself.

Iruka goes to the memorial stone. He knows he can’t tell him anything about Naruto, not in specifics, but he wants to feel his ANBU’s presence anyway, desperately yearns for the comfort of his chakra.

But his ANBU isn’t there. 

The Uchiha massacre occurs and one of Iruka’s class is the sole survivor. He doesn’t know what to do. He tries to talk to Sasuke, tries to get him the help he so clearly needs. He begs the Sandaime to send him to a Yamanaka, a counselor, anyone. Nothing helps, and the familiar weight of depression settles in Iruka’s chest, making it so difficult just to get dressed in the mornings. His own uselessness is making him doubt everything that he’s been working towards for the last three years.

He goes to the memorial stone, but his ANBU still isn’t there. 

He’s never there.

He has to take two days off for chakra exhaustion because he spends the entire night at the memorial, using his mother’s technique over and over and over again, waiting for his ANBU to show up. 

He doesn’t.

Iruka doesn’t know if his ANBU is dead or alive. Doesn’t even know if the guy gave a crap about Iruka in the first place, or if the whole thing was just something Iruka built up in his head because he was so desperate to have someone to talk to.

It doesn’t matter, because Iruka’s ANBU is gone, and once again, he’s alone.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Things are finally starting to pick up pace. And get a smidgen less depressing. ^_^"

Iruka’s first impression of Hatake Kakashi is that he’s one of those jounin whose eccentricity perfectly matches their skill in combat. This perception is cemented at their very first interaction.

With the absence of his ANBU, Iruka has found a plethora of time that he suddenly needs to fill with anything other than his own thoughts. He still goes to the memorial stone, of course. He has his parents to speak to if no one else. But he had always stayed longer when he had company, someone _living_ that he knew was listening and absorbing his words. Without that, Iruka needs distractions. Extra money isn’t bad, either. So he starts picking up shifts at the mission desk.

He quickly learns that everyone who works there is a damn idiot. 

Organizing the hastily packed mission scrolls takes him a good two weeks alone before he can even start accepting incoming reports. Most of the other chuunin seem to be inattentive sloths, willing to accept just about anything and barely skimming what comes across the desk. He takes it upon himself to fix that, starting with the jounin who have the impression that, since their rank is higher than the chuunin reviewing the report, they can get away with anything. 

Perhaps Iruka is a little over-zealous in correcting them.

Might Guy draws attention like an elephant in the marketplace, and with all the bumbling grace of one, too. Iruka has heard of his prowess, knows he’s called the Blue Beast of Konoha (though why he isn’t the _green_ beast, Iruka hasn’t quite figured out given the man’s trademark jumpsuit), and knows that he’s a jounin, which necessitates a certain level of skill far beyond Iruka’s. However, his skill is hidden beneath copious layers of gauche fervor, and it’s his personality and eccentricities that tend to catch the eye rather than his hard-earned prowess. 

He normally comes by early in the morning while Iruka’s teaching at the Academy. One of the first few times Iruka has to deal with him is about two months after he starts at the mission desk. Iruka watches the ostentatious man step into his line and wonders if the report will be obsessively pristine or nearly torn to pieces with enthusiasm. 

Then, he realizes that it isn’t really Might Guy in his line at all—he’s merely accosting the actual shinobi in question, someone with a bright shock of silver hair and a bored, drawling tone. The mask is what catches Iruka’s attention, then the hitai-ate sloped over one eye. He knows what it covers, even if he’s never seen it in person.

His eyes flick back to the tokubetsu in front of him and he smiles politely as he stamps her report. “Thank you for your hard work, Tohru-san.” She gives him a pleasant nod and slips away, bringing to focus the two shinobi behind her.

Might Guy’s jaw hangs loose from its hinges and comically proportioned offense colors every word in a scandalized hue. “Kakashi! I’ll have you know, I am as Youthful and full of Vigor as—”

“Yeah, yeah, but even so, I’m not. I’m still recovering.” Kakashi of the Sharingan holds out his mission report without sparing Iruka a glance. Well, Iruka supposes he doesn’t have an eye to spare, given how deeply he seems to be enthralled in the pornographic novel held up to his nose. 

Iruka purses his lips as he accepts the scroll, skimming through the contents. His eyebrows rise when he notes a doodle in one corner. It’s a crude sketch, lacking shading and depth, but fairly clearly depicts a wrinkly, smushed-nose dog wearing a Konoha hitai-ate. “I wouldn’t want to dishonor you by fighting when I’m not at my best.” Kakashi continues, sounding about as sincere as a cat feigning obedience. He still hasn’t looked at Iruka, and that bothers the chuunin _almost_ as much as the numerous errors he sees on the report itself.

“Gah, Kakashi! You truly Value our Rivalry!” Tears well in Guy’s big black eyes, droplets as fat as his eyebrows. “But really, we’re in the Springtime of our Youth and—”

“Ah, excuse me.” Iruka interrupts. Guy looks over at him, surprise blanking his features. Kakashi’s spine straightens, a taut wire drawing along his shoulders. A slate gray eye darts up to meet Iruka’s gaze for the first time. The stare is intense, and Iruka balks for a moment, glancing back down at the scroll. The break in eye contact feels like it should come with an audible crack. 

“Er…” Iruka blinks at the nearly illegible name near the top of the report even though he’s heard confirmation of the name from Guy himself. He forces a tight smile and meets the man’s eye again. “Kakashi-san, I’m afraid I can’t accept this.”

There’s silence for several long moments in which Kakashi continues to stare. Iruka can see pale fingers clenched tightly around the bottom of his gaudy orange paperback, and he’s aware that most of the room has fallen silent to watch. Iruka stands his ground. He’s garnered something of a reputation for dealing with jounin who try to use their rank to slip by, and he isn’t going to be cowed now. 

But while Iruka is expecting a sharp retort, anticipating the tense energy Kakashi radiates to turn into annoyance or arrogance, the man fails to deliver. He gives a single cough and clears his throat. “Huh?”

Iruka’s brows furrow, smile dropping into a frown. Kakashi looks as though he can’t believe the situation, and Iruka remembers _why_ he’s never taken one of Kakashi’s reports: ANBU. Kakashi must have been used to handing them in only to the Hokage himself. Compared to the Sandaime, he probably thinks Iruka has no right to demand higher standards.

“I can’t accept this.” Iruka repeats firmly. The paper slides across the desk as he pushes it back towards Kakashi, who makes no move to take it. He also hasn’t lowered his book. Perhaps he thinks he can stare Iruka into submission. Iruka continues, tone clipped as freshly mown grass. “It’s nearly illegible, there’s a doodle of a dog in the upper left-hand corner, and you didn’t even begin to fill out section 2-C. Please fix these errors before submitting it.” 

He’s lucky Iruka isn’t making him redo the report entirely, and he has the urge to insist on just that if Kakashi keeps staring at him like he’s grown a third head.

“Oh.” The jounin’s eye finally slides down to the scroll, but he doesn’t reach for it. Iruka’s starting to lose patience. The other occupants of the room are transfixed, waiting for one of them to cave, and it sure as hell isn’t going to be Iruka. Seconds tick by in a stalemate before the standoff is broken by Guy, who grabs the scroll and places a broad hand on Kakashi’s stiff shoulder.

“Our apologies, Iruka-sensei.” Guy’s teeth gleam, unnaturally white in the artificial lighting. Iruka isn’t really looking for an apology, and certainly not from Guy, but the proper use of his title mollifies him. He doesn’t think Guy has a single rude bone in his body. “I’ll make sure he completes the forms Properly! You have it on my Honor as a Shinobi of Konoha!” He forms a big thumbs-up around the scroll, pausing like he’s waiting for his picture to be taken. 

“Right.” Iruka’s not sure of the proper response to that. “Well, thank you, Guy-san.” Guy’s still waiting, and Iruka can’t help but wish he really did have a camera, purely because it seems expected. Kakashi’s eye returns to him, an inscrutable expression on the scant quarter of his face that’s visible. Iruka tilts his chin to indicate the others in the room. “If you wouldn’t mind doing it out of the line, though, there are people waiting.”

“Of course, Iruka-sensei. We’ll be back in Mere Minutes with a Gleaming Report, or I’ll perform three hundred back-flips before Sundown!”

Iruka raises a dubious eyebrow. He’s certain that’s unnecessary, but he doesn’t say as much because all he really wants is the two men out of his line. Finally Guy acquiesces, he and Kakashi wandering off to the far corner of the room. Iruka watches them go, wondering how in the world that friendship works, before his attention is drawn by the next person in line, a new chuunin who gives Iruka a hesitant smile that Iruka forces himself to return. 

He’s heard of ‘The Man of a Thousand Jutsu’. Of course he has. What he actually knows about the man, though, can be counted on one hand: he fought in the last Great Shinobi War, he has the sharingan dojutsu (though not from birth), and he’s a jounin but only recently added to the active mission roster (which in and of itself is enough to presume he’s retired from ANBU). 

The reasons for any of those things are highly rumored. Iruka has heard it said that Kakashi is a genius who joined ANBU at the tender age of twelve and that he’d been retired from ANBU due to either gross disobedience or mental instability. (Or, if Iruka listens to his young female coworkers, a steamy love affair with a member of his team.) Iruka has heard other whispers, worse things including supposed details on how exactly Kakashi had received his sharingan, but he takes those with a grain of sand. 

The Sandaime trusts Hatake Kakashi; that’s all Iruka needs to know. 

But that doesn’t mean he has to like the man, particularly when he’s a fully-fledged jounin who can’t even file a simple mission report.

While dealing with the next person, Iruka occasionally glances to Kakashi, who appears to be studiously working on his paper. He’s tall and lean, lithe in a way that reminds Iruka of a large cat: predatory, sleek, with a grace suited to landing feet-down from tall branches and carving out throats in the dead of night. Iruka can’t see much of Kakashi’s skin, but what little is visible is pale like alabaster, covering corded muscles stronger than steel. His fingers curve around the pencil and Iruka can easily see him wielding a tanto, throwing shuriken. Everything about him screams _danger_ , and yet his expression is bored and half-lidded, tone as smooth and reflective as the undisturbed surface of a lake at sunset, when the angle is steep and the water colored with bloody hues. 

Iruka’s line is empty when Kakashi finishes. His single eye curves into a little arch as it meets Iruka’s, crinkling at the corners like a paper napkin. It gives the impression of a smile, although Iruka can’t tell if the expression is mimicked on his lips, not underneath the dark mask. He’s visibly less tense than before, shoulders curled forward into an indolent slouch. Iruka takes the proffered scroll and turns his attention to it. 

When Kakashi speaks, his voice is a pleasant, mild baritone. But levity is forced in it like poor vibrato; nice until you focus on it and notice the sharp, uneven edges that speak of insincerity. “Ah, sorry about that. I feel like we got off on the wrong foot. I’m Hatake Kakashi.” Iruka glances up to see Kakashi raise a gloved hand in a bright wave. 

Iruka can’t say his first impression is very good, but he can keep his irritation to himself if the jounin is going to play nice. And, from what he can tell, Kakashi _did_ fix the report. “Umino Iruka.” He offers, skimming down the lines of erased and re-written kana. It’s not perfect, but it’s marginally better and he can respect the attempt. As a teacher, he’s is very aware that any level of improvement is still improvement. He decides to reward the effort and stamps the form, slipping it into the intake box. He skims the list tacked between him and the station beside the names of shinobi who have specific assignments. 

“Thank you for your hard work, Kakashi-san. The Hokage left a new mission for you, let me get it.” He pushes off of his chair and turns to the filing cabinets, performing a few quick seals that he blocks from view with his body to open the S-rank drawer. There are only two scrolls inside, not unusual since most S-rank missions go to ANBU, who receive their orders directly from the Hokage himself. One of the scrolls is marked with the first kana of Kakashi’s name. “Here it is.” He turns back to Kakashi, whose gaze rises to meet his. Iruka allows his smile to be warmer this time, genuine, because he has honestly suffered through much worse at the hands of jounin. Anyone that takes his critiques without complaint is worthy of a real smile, and Kakashi has redeemed at least a modicum of good favor in his eyes. “Good luck, Kakashi-san.” 

Kakashi gives a nod of acknowledgement. Their fingers don’t touch as he takes the scroll, and then his leave.

After that, it isn’t unusual to see Kakashi in his line at the mission desk, and Iruka starts to make more observations about the man. (It’s not like he has much else to do, now that the scrolls are pristinely ordered and the chuunin manning the desk are too scared of Iruka to accept a less-than-stunning report.)

Kakashi acts lazy, and his mission reports can certainly attest to that, but there’s a sharp awareness in his one droopy eye that makes Iruka uncomfortable. He can’t quite put his finger on it, but he’s never truly relaxed when Kakashi’s around. Of course, irritation may play a decent role in that, especially after receiving one memorable report in which every possible word is a tautogram, starting with the exact same kana. It gave Iruka a headache just to look at. 

He just wishes the bastard would learn how to write a decent report. That first time Kakashi was almost polite, fixing his scroll exactly how Iruka asked, so he knows it’s possible. But after that he has a bad tendency to disappear through a window before Iruka can fully finish his rants. It’s disrespectful to say the least, and the amusement that Kakashi seemed to find in Iruka’s suffering only serves to piss him off more. It makes him wish his ANBU would reappear, so he would have someone to complain to about the constant annoyance that is Hatake Kakashi. 

Kakashi’s reports continue to be nearly illegible at the best of times, and Iruka’s ANBU doesn’t reappear. 

Iruka’s life falls into a stable, if monotonous, rhythm. He spends the morning and afternoon attempting to pound knowledge into the obstinate minds of children and learning firsthand exactly how Jitsuko-sensei must have felt. Then he mans the mission desk, putting the fear of Iruka into the souls of men more talented than himself. In the evenings, he sits at the memorial stone and pretends that he’s showing his technique to his mother rather than using it to look for someone he has never truly seen. Then he goes home and grades papers or looks over his lesson plans. Once a week or so, Izumo and Kotetsu will drag him out for a drink at the Sharpened Kunai, or Mizuki will decide to grace Iruka with his presence because his latest girlfriend is too busy for a booty call and Iruka’s the second best company. 

Then he falls asleep alone in an empty bed and a cold apartment, listening to the absolute silence that encases him, and wishing his soft comforter were replaced with scratchy, too-hot wool.

Iruka also worries for his students. 

Iruka worries for Sasuke, who has withdrawn into himself and sees the world through a lens of bitterness and hatred, who refuses to speak to Iruka, or the Sandaime, or the Yamanaka counselor, or anyone else. Who has been betrayed by the one person he held most dear and has decided to never again let someone close enough to hurt him. Iruka knows there’s a scared little boy hiding in there, but he’s been jaded and poisoned by the desire for revenge, and Iruka doesn’t know how to breach that hard exterior to find the vulnerable kid within.

Iruka worries for Hinata, who is afraid of everything around her and can barely speak for the anxiety that grips her throat when she tries. He hates to think of what Hinata has experienced that has so thoroughly destroyed her self-esteem, and he wants so badly to pull her father aside and demand answers, but he knows he can’t. He knows that the Hyuugas are an old family with prestige and power, making them invulnerable even though their honor doesn’t extend to caring for their own children.

Iruka worries for Shino, who is quiet not because of fear or hatred, but because he’s not accepted by most of the others. Oh, none of the students say it, at least not when Iruka’s in earshot, but he knows what many of them are thinking (particularly those with civilian heritage), because there had been an Aburame in his class, too: that the bugs are creepy, disgusting, that Shino’s body, which is riddled with holes that house them, is somehow diseased. He can see it in the way the children avoid Shino, in the way that Shino only ever speaks to Iruka or the classroom in general, rarely addressing a fellow student directly. He knows Shino is aware of it, but he can’t change what the students think other than educating them about the different types of jutsu, how they all have their merits and don’t reflect poorly or well on those who use them. 

Iruka worries for Naruto, who he wants so badly to help, but he has no clue how. He thinks at first that it’ll be easy, that he just has to give Naruto some of the attention that he so desperately craves, like the Sandaime did for Iruka. Except Naruto’s pain is different. Naruto hasn’t lost anyone; he never had them to begin with. His loneliness is built into his body like mortar, there from the ground up. Iruka, with the confines placed on him by the school board, can’t even begin to give the boy enough attention and care to replace what he’s never had. 

So Iruka watches, and he wishes, and he makes vain attempts to help where he can, but at the end of the day each of the children leave his care and Iruka is forced to recognize that, no matter how much he wishes, he doesn’t truly have the power to change anything. 

But Iruka is an optimist. So he keeps trying. He keeps working. He keeps sleeping and eating and mourning and training and accepting Mizuki whenever he comes knocking, because Iruka still has hope that his friend can change for the better.

And he still waits for his ANBU.

Perhaps ‘optimist’ is just a kind word for a fool.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WARNING: Vague descriptions of sexual relations between Kakashi/Anko and Iruka/OC. They're NOT major themes in the story, there's no real romance, and it's not explicit--but it is there.
> 
> So KakaYama seems to be winning the poll on my ff.net account (RenGoneMad) for what pairing to write next, so it looks like I'll be doing that unless it changes in the next couple days. I'm putting Spoken as my top priority, though, so updates of this will keep coming out regularly. ^.^ I hope you all enjoy!

His ANBU has been gone for eleven months, and eventually Iruka has to consider him either dead, or on a mission deep undercover in enemy territory, the sort of thing from which few return. Iruka can’t believe that he has just chosen to stop visiting the memorial, not after mourning for so many years. 

Iruka looks at the newest names on the stone, traces them with his finger, and wonders if any of them could be the boy with silver hair and chakra that tingles like static. 

It feels like loss. Not quite the loss of his parents, but it still hurts. Rather than forgetting about his ANBU, Iruka finds himself thinking of him more and more as the months pass. He makes a habit of passing by his ANBU’s tree on his way back from the memorial stone, with the excuse of taking a shortcut through the training grounds.

At one point, Iruka nearly asks the Hokage. It’s an insane thought, born of exhaustion and desperation and the intense feeling of helplessness that has invaded him since realizing being a teacher doesn’t mean solving everyone’s problems for them. It’s on the tip of his tongue during his monthly tea with the Sandaime, waiting to spill forth, when he realizes how ridiculous his obsession has become if he’s considering asking for information about an ANBU he should, by all rights, have no idea even exists.

Iruka sips his tea and turns the subject to his students.

The summer festival is normally Iruka’s favorite day of the year. It’s warm and lively, with vendors selling specialty foods and children’s laughter filling the streets. Some of the chuunin put on a show for the kids, flashy jutsu that has little use in battle but that sparkles with pretty colors or sends paper dragons soaring through the sky on a current of wind and chakra string. The fireworks are brilliant, too, and have become even more impressive over the last few years.

Since at least one of Iruka’s parents was often working during the festival, he always attended with Mizuki. It was a tradition that had never failed, except the year that Iruka made chuunin. 

Mizuki hadn’t.

Strangely enough, Mizuki is the one to suggest attending together this year. With the smell of fried foods filling his lungs and the chatter of cheerful people, Iruka can almost pretend he’s a child again. The only differences are that he’s now grown into his father’s sky blue yukata, and that the copious amounts of dango he consumes are chased with sake rather than warm cider. But he and Mizuki still travel from stall to stall, the air is still warm with chiming bells and happy families, and Iruka still can’t think of any place he would rather be. 

Anko’s husky voice breaks through the din and Iruka turns, half-expecting her to tackle him. Instead, she’s hanging onto the arm of Hatake Kakashi, a huge grin on her face that isn’t replicated on his. Or, Iruka doesn’t _think_ so, because he meets Iruka’s eye with a sober intensity that belies their surroundings. 

Iruka doesn’t know what to make of that, so he gives an automatic, polite smile and nod, and then Mizuki is tugging him away to go to another stall, this one run by his current girlfriend. After a moment he looks back over his shoulder, easily catching sight of Kakashi and Anko where they’ve stopped in front of the dango cart.

They make a strange pair, static among the milling crowd. He’s dressed in his normal jounin uniform, weapons and all, and could be on duty for all Iruka would be able to tell the difference. Anko is beautiful in her crimson obi and black yukata, into which she reaches and pulls out a silver flask. She shakes it appealingly at Kakashi, and Iruka watches as they turn towards an alley that he knows will lead them towards the jounin apartments. 

Anko is someone who Iruka considers one of his closest friends. Like most of the people who seem to surround Iruka, she isn’t a fantastic listener, but she’s brighter, happier, than almost anyone he knows. Iruka hadn’t met her until after she was placed in Izumo and Kotetsu’s team, after her original jounin-sensei, Orochimaru, had been discovered of crimes against humanity and fled the village. But he knows the rough basics, knows she had considered the man a mentor even beyond the basic role of jounin-sensei. Knows that she’s been scarred by him, in the kind of way that a child can only be by those they love most.

Iruka thinks it’s because of her experiences that she has a tendency to treat relationships as purely casual, distancing herself from people who try to get too close. She does it in friendships as well as with lovers, and Iruka has seen plenty of both come and go over the years. But he thought the two of them were past that. He thought that she trusted him, at least as much as she could anyone. It isn’t as though they are constantly in each other’s company; they have the sort of friendship where they won’t speak outside of the mission room for a month, but then she’ll show up at his door with a bottle of alcohol and spill all of her secrets out in a single night, as if she’s tried to contain them for so long that they have no choice but to overflow, and she trusts Iruka to catch them as they drop.

She had never once mentioned that she had any relationship with Kakashi, or even knew him beyond reputation, and yet Iruka can’t help but think that the way she smiled at him, the easy and natural way she held onto his arm, indicates physical familiarity. Iruka’s sure he’s complained about Kakashi’s reports to her, so the subject has certainly come up. It’s also not as though Iruka isn’t aware Anko is sexually active, and they really don’t discuss her conquests more than those occasional inebriated nights when he can’t quite shut her up, but… for some reason, Iruka feels as though _this_ is something he should have known. Something she should have told him.

He supposes it shouldn’t matter, just like it shouldn’t matter when Mizuki spends so long talking to his girlfriend that Iruka wanders off to watch the fireworks alone. Couples kiss around him, some stumbling off into the woods for a drunken fumble. Everyone has someone to spend the night with, it seems. Someone to keep them company. Other than Iruka. 

The festival is winding down when Iruka spots a tanzaku stall. There’s just enough sake in his bloodstream to prompt an impulsive action. He intends to write something for his parents but, when he raises his pen to the blank surface, the words that come to him have nothing to do with his parents at all. He thinks of Anko and Kakashi, Mizuki and the civilian girl, Izumo and Kotetsu, and he thinks of the one person he wishes he could spend the night with, albeit in a different way. Even if the only contact they had was platonic, barely-even-real brushes of chakra that tasted like lightning, it was something. Something Iruka could count on.

The walk to the memorial stone seems longer than usual, but it’s a familiar path. He spends a few minutes in front of the stone, praying to his parents for guidance. Then he walks to his ANBU’s tree, still as vacant as it has been for nearly a year, and loops the tag around the branch that he can recognize without having to think twice. Written on the tanzaku is one simple phrase, one that Iruka means with all his heart:

_‘I hope you’re alive and well.’_

Then he heads home and drinks sake alone until his head is fuzzy enough to drown out the sounds of celebration in the streets.

Iruka hates hangovers. He truly, truly does. They aren’t normally a problem because he only drinks with his friends, meaning they get enough water into him that he never has more than a small headache. This time, he has no one to blame but himself. He manages to get himself up and dressed sometime around noon and decides that there’s nothing like greasy ramen to settle the churning in his stomach. He squints when he steps out into the light and counts his good fortune that the streets are mostly empty. The day after a festival is often the quietest of the year, as the children are tuckered out, the singles have hooked up, and the parents are suffering hangovers or taking advantage of the peace. 

Iruka is twenty-one years old, and he already has the mentality of an old married man without even the spouse to make it worthwhile. 

Ichiraku is open, and Iruka has to resist the temptation to fall asleep with his head on the counter while Teuchi prepares his regular. 

“‘Morning.” Someone says behind him. Iruka looks behind him to see Anko lifting the curtain to enter, a broad band of sunlight following. Iruka hisses and turns back to the front as Anko stifles a yawn.

“It’s almost one in the afternoon.” Iruka says, eying her as she sits beside him. She’s in her usual skirt and fishnet top, having left her coat behind to beat the midday summer heat. 

“Yeah, well.” Anko grins, throwing him an exaggerated wink. “Late night.” She turns to give Teuchi her order.

It’s the sort of flirty, throw-away comment that Anko routinely makes and Iruka routinely ignores. This time, his stomach flips in an unpleasant way, and the image of her holding onto Kakashi’s arm fills his mind’s eye. His mouth tastes bitter and he chugs half his glass of water. The few seconds of extra time does nothing to restrain the words Iruka tries not to say. “You and Kakashi. How long has that been going on?” 

Anko’s eyebrows rise. “Since when do you want to talk about my sex life?”

“I don’t.” Iruka denies instinctively. He shrugs a shoulder in a hopefully casual manner and turns to his steaming bowl of ramen as it’s placed in front of him. “I was just curious. I didn’t know you two were friends.”

“Hmm. I don’t think Kakashi really has friends.” Anko rests her chin on her fist. The words seem harsh, but her tone is contemplative rather than cutting. “‘Cept for Guy, maybe. We just fuck now and then. Not that I’d say no to something a bit more regular, the man’s hot as hell. But I learned years ago to be happy with what I get when it comes to Hatake.” 

There is so much information packed in there that Iruka feels dizzy with it all. His traitorous mind is dead set on recreating in vivid imagery exactly how ‘hot’ Kakashi might be without cloth covering every inch of his skin. But there’s one thing more imminently important than the rest, something that makes the ramen in his throat fall like lead. “ _Years_?”

“Yeah, a few.” Anko tries to sneak a hand to Iruka’s chopsticks and he bats it away on automatic. “Like I said, it’s totally casual and it doesn’t happen often. Maybe twice a year at most.” Her tone lowers to something more serious. “Look, I know I don’t have to tell you this, but… don’t mention it to anyone, including Izumo and Kotetsu, ‘kay? It’s not like it’s a secret, but. There’s enough rumors about him, ya know? I think he likes a little privacy.” 

So that was why she hadn’t said anything. Not because she wanted to withhold it, or even necessarily because she didn’t trust Iruka, but because she was protecting Kakashi. It’s strange, honorable in a way Anko normally isn’t, but it makes the sting of betrayal lessen. 

Anko swiftly changes the subject by leaning into Iruka, whispering conspiratorial in his ear. “Speaking of sex lives, I actually came here to see you. I’ve found the perfect guy. He just made tokubetsu, he thinks you’re cute, and best of all, he’s still bordering on sane.” Her grin creeps towards manic, and Iruka wonders if he should really allow her to be the judge of anyone’s sanity. “Whaddaya think? Ready to let your hair down? Dip your toes in, break new ground, wet your whistle, pop your—”

“I have a kunai and I’m not afraid to use it.”

“Oh, is that what it is? I thought you were just happy to see me.” Her gleeful cackles are loud enough to be almost painful, as close to his ear as they are. His cheeks burn red and it’s on the tip of his tongue to tell her no, but… Iruka thinks of the festival, last night, his cold apartment, drinking alone—and maybe it’s just the hangover, but he feels reckless.

“What’s his name?”

Iruka isn’t going to let someone else set him up. He can get his own dates, thank you. (Except history would prove him wrong.) The next time the guy she mentioned comes into the mission room, he strikes up a conversation (after making sure his report is pristine—Iruka’s not going to ask someone out if they can’t put a little effort into their job). He doesn’t have much experience flirting, but he smiles a lot and apparently Anko’s right, because Hansuke blushes and the conversation ends with a promise to meet up later. 

The “date” seems more like having drinks with a friend than anything else, even though it doesn’t take long for Hansuke to admit that he’s interested in Iruka in more than a platonic capacity, so he knows there’s no misinterpretation. Iruka didn’t expect the rendezvous to be much different in any _practical_ way, seeing as neither of them would have been comfortable with broadcasting their intentions to the entirety of Konoha, but he thought it would feel… meaningful, somehow. Exciting. There is a small flutter of nervous anticipation in his stomach, but it’s nothing Iruka hasn’t felt and ignored a hundred times before. 

Hansuke is nice, a few years older than Iruka, with short blond hair and a pleasant smile. They don’t have much in common, but Iruka’s good at small talk so there aren’t many awkward silences. The man likes animals, which is a point in his favor, and he’s interested in hearing Iruka talk about the stranger aspects of his job. He listens, and Iruka thinks that might be enough.

They sleep together a week later, after the second date. It’s... fine. More awkward than he had expected, but Hansuke clearly isn’t new to sex with men and he manages to prepare Iruka with almost no pain. Iruka struggles to come; maybe because it’s his first time, maybe because he rushed into this before really getting to know the guy so any attraction he feels is purely surface-level, built more on the expectation of something than the reality of it. Iruka tries to stay in Hansuke’s bed afterwards, knows it would be rude to leave, but it’s uncomfortable. He stares at the ceiling, listening to a virtual stranger snore beside him. 

He doesn’t think this is what he was looking for.

Though they speak in a friendly manner once or twice after that, they don’t discuss another date.

Iruka has already made a habit of walking by his ANBU’s tree each time he visits the memorial stone, so the sight of the white tag fluttering in the breeze has become familiar. It develops smudges over the next few weeks, from leaves or fallen pollen or wind kicking up dirt. Iruka wonders how long it will last, if it’ll make it to next year’s festival or if he will have to replace it before. He can buy a few extra tags next year, just in case a storm or precocious pre-genin end up destroying it early.

The idea of keeping the tanzaku as a memorial to his ANBU isn’t one that Iruka comes up with consciously. It slowly forms over days and nights as the sight of it becomes routine. He likes it. It feels like a memorial of his very own, a memorial that doesn’t require a face or name, but something more individual than the fluttering ribbons during the Kyuubi funeral. Whether his ANBU is alive or dead, Iruka wants to remember him, because the idea of wasting years talking to someone who doesn’t care is too painful for him to accept.

Three weeks after Iruka places it, he ends up heading to the memorial stone before class instead of after. He had woken just before dawn with no chance of returning to sleep, assaulted with images of his parents hugging each other after returning home, tucking Iruka into bed, scolding him for sneaking a stray kitten into his room. Absorbed by sensory memories of his mother’s comb running gently through his hair, the scent of his father’s aftershave, the sound of fat popping as bacon fries in the skillet, lavender-scented detergent. The nightmares have dwindled in frequency over the years, but when they occur, they affect him just the same. Adrenaline courses through his veins, ice in his heart and fire on his skin, sweat soaking his sheets and so much pain that he can’t even breathe to sob.

His recovery time is faster than when he was a child. Instead of laying in bed for countless hours, refusing to stand even for food or basic hygiene, he’s able to get his ass up and go through the motions necessary when one has the responsibility of an adult. After the nightmare, he’d bundled up underneath his kotatsu and finished grading papers that weren’t due to be handed out for a few more days. Productivity, he thinks, is marginally better than crippling depression. 

He’s shuffling through the thick grass, head down and wondering if he can justify putting the practical test of their shuriken skills off until next week, when he reaches his ANBU’s branch. He reaches a hand up to touch the tanzaku, another action that has become habit, when he stops in his tracks. There’s no off-white string wrapped around the branch, no tag dangling just below eyeline. 

Iruka’s heart thuds and he whips around, scanning the forest floor. It’s summer, so the leaves haven’t been falling at a quick rate and there haven’t been many storms. It was there only five days ago, Iruka reasons, eyes darting around wildly. It can’t have gone far. He doesn’t have another tanzaku yet, doesn’t have anything to replace it with, and suddenly that frightens Iruka nearly as much as his nightmares. 

He circles the tree, eyes glued to the ground, when he decides it may have gotten caught in a neighboring branch. He looks up and catches sight of something nearly the same off-white as the tanzaku, but a very different shape. He takes a step back and the image comes into focus. 

It’s two kana, carved into the bark of the tree and revealing the pale wood underneath. It only takes Iruka a split-second to understand, because it’s a message he always looks for in the reports he receives. It’s ingrained into his mind, into the mind of every shinobi, and provides relief so rich it almost feels like home.

_‘Mission accomplished.’_

Iruka traces the kana, the tender wood, and imagines that boy in the dog mask destroying a kunai to leave it. Imagines him taking the tanzaku as a gift, a comfort, the same way that they had exchanged a wool blanket years before. 

Warmth suffuses Iruka’s chest and his smile stretches until his cheeks ache with it. 

His ANBU is alive, and suddenly, Iruka’s not alone.

Elation carries him through the rest of the day at the Academy. He feels as though he’s been given the greatest gift, one that he had almost given up hoping for but which he could never forget wanting. His nightmares are all but forgotten and Iruka teaches the class with half of his mind on the subject, half of it with the memorial stone. He can’t wait for the day to be over, for sunset to fall, because his ANBU most often came when the only vestiges of the sun’s light were in a pink and purple streaked sky. 

He tries to rein himself in, to quell the impatience in his blood, and he gradually manages it over the course of the day. Iruka’s ANBU just returned from a year-long mission, he reasons. The man isn’t going to be sent on another assignment before the week is up. They have time, and it’s even possible his ANBU won’t show that night at all. He could have had friends or family to catch up with. Iruka probably ranks rather low on the totem pole of social obligations, and that’s fine. Iruka fully recognizes he’s the one with emotional dependency in this—well, what can not even reasonably be called a friendship.

He’s come to terms with it. All he wants is to talk to his ANBU again, feel the electric zing of his chakra, have someone to listen to him and keep him company even if they can’t really meet. He wishes he could offer his ANBU something in return, perhaps ask him what mission had kept him gone for so long, but Iruka knows better. 

The message his ANBU left proves that he cares, at least to some small degree. That he’ll come back.

There’ll be time. 

The kids might mention that Iruka yells at them less than normal, and he smiles as he asks them if they would like to write two scrolls on the political situation surrounding the Nidaime’s treaty with the first Mizukage. They balk and shake their heads emphatically, and Iruka has to bite back a grin. Not even Naruto’s antics and the sweltering heat can diminish his good will towards the world.

When time finally comes to unleash the children upon the earth, Iruka wipes the sweat from his brow and sets off on the Academy grounds in the direction of the memorial stone. It will be a couple hours until it’s likely for his ANBU to appear, but he can speak to his parents until then. Over the course of the day his excitement has ebbed into a pleasant hum, content anticipation, but he’s not going to get any grading done if he goes home. A shower, though, might not go amiss—

There’s someone nearby. Iruka can feel their presence even without using his mother’s technique, but when he looks around, he sees no one. They aren’t attempting to hide themselves, so it’s doubtful it’s anything to be concerned about. Iruka starts heading in the direction he senses it anyway, towards a large tanoak tree. It could be Naruto; Iruka has found him loitering on school grounds before. He doesn’t have the heart to send the kid alone to an empty apartment, so those are normally the days that he takes Naruto to Ichiraku. It’s been a while since he’s done that. He could do it today. He has time.

Except that what he sees in the tree after he gets close enough to peer up into the foliage isn’t an orange and yellow ball of enthusiasm, but a full-grown man in a jounin uniform and slanted hitai-ate, a shock of bright silver hair, and one eye that’s closed as his chest rises and falls in the deep breaths of sleep. 

He would look almost serene if not for, well, the blood.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for missing Monday's upload! I'll generally make a note on the upload schedule on my profile if there's a day I know I'll miss. Hopefully there won't be any more delays. ^.^ Thank you all for your amazing comments and kudos! The story will start moving pretty quickly from this point on.

“Kakashi-san?” Iruka expects the shinobi to jump to attention, perhaps draw a kunai. He is ANBU, after all, even ex. But Kakashi doesn’t stir. “Kakashi-san?” He questions once more, a bit louder. One bleary gray eye opens to fix on him, blinking a few times before focusing. “Is there a reason you’re sleeping in a tree? And why you look like you got in a nasty fight with an alley cat?” 

The answer doesn’t come immediately. Kakashi’s looks to the school and then the sky. Iruka starts to wonder if he’s suffering from a concussion when Kakashi finally turns his attention back to him. “Maa, you know, dogs and cats and all that.” He mutters with a dismissive wave of his hand. 

“Mhm.” Iruka wonders if Kakashi is the metaphorical dog in this scenario. “And the tree?” 

“The cat chased me up. You haven’t seen it, have you? Vicious creature. Huge, aggressive. Wears a lot of green spandex.” 

The description surprises a chuckle from Iruka. He’s seen Might Guy accost Kakashi more than once in the past few months, and he can easily imagine Kakashi sleeping in a tree to get away from one of his insane challenges. “I think it’s safe to come down now.” He says with a smile. 

Kakashi slips off the tree and lands gracefully in front of Iruka. From this short distance Iruka can clearly see that, while some of the blood might not be Kakashi’s own, at least a portion of it comes from slashes in the sleeves of Kakashi’s uniform, multiple streaks evenly spaced and give the impression of claw marks.

Iruka isn’t quite sure what makes him offer. Perhaps it’s the similarity in this scenario with the first (and only) time he met his ANBU. Perhaps it’s just instinct. Either way, the words come tumbling from his mouth before he can make the conscious effort to restrain them. “I can help with that.” 

It isn’t until Iruka glances up to meet Kakashi’s blank expression that he realizes the strange segue his thoughts had taken. He gestures awkwardly towards Kakashi’s arm. “The scratches, I mean. I’m not a medic, but I learned a bit since, you know, pre-genin and shuriken.” No visible reaction. Iruka taps the end of his scar in a nervous tick. “But, uh, if you don’t want—”

“No.” Kakashi interrupts. Iruka’s left confused as to which part Kakashi is denying. “I mean, yes. You can heal me.” Kakashi’s words are disjointed, stiff, but he gives a firm nod. 

“Alright.” Iruka smiles hesitantly and turns towards the school. “I’m afraid my classroom’s not air conditioned, but at least it’s somewhere to sit.” 

It’s a short walk back inside, and there’s relief from the sun beating down on their necks as soon as they cross the threshold of the building. When they enter his classroom, Iruka indicates the benches and Kakashi sits on one close to the door, turning so his back faces the wall. He rolls up his left sleeve while Iruka sits on the seat opposite and takes his arm, cradling Kakashi’s elbow gently and leaning in for a closer look. 

The three worst slashes run from the back of his wrist almost to his elbow, and the direction indicates Kakashi raised his arm to block the attack. The scratches are relatively shallow; deep enough to draw a decent amount of blood, but not to tear through muscle or tendon. They’re already scabbed over, so Iruka won’t have to stay the bleeding. Still, preventing infection and allowing more freedom of movement without reopening the cuts will ensure Kakashi’s in a better position for his next mission. Iruka has a feeling he might not have bothered getting healed otherwise. 

Iruka hovers his right hand just above the skin, channeling yin and yang chakra in a careful balance. While he hadn’t initially learned healing jutsu because of the children, they could certainly take the credit for being his unwilling subjects while he perfected it. Kakashi doesn’t so much as flinch as Iruka’s chakra brushes against the wounds. 

“So, what did these?” Iruka asks to break the uncomfortable silence. He and Kakashi have never had a real conversation that didn’t result in righteous scolding on his own part (fully justified by Kakashi’s awful mission reports), but that doesn’t bother Iruka so much. He’s always found friendly conversation easy to navigate even with those he dislikes (and who dislike him), and becoming a teacher has only strengthened that ability. 

The real problem is the inches of bare skin revealed to him, the narrow scars and corded muscles, the warmth that emanates from Kakashi even though there’s cloth covering every place of contact between them. It’s casual, platonic contact that Iruka wouldn’t think twice of if done in the field, but something makes Iruka unusually aware of their close proximity and the way his breaths sound in the quiet room. Perhaps it’s the thoughts generated by Anko’s words, or the revelation of pale skin normally shielded from prying eyes. Yes, it’s curiosity of the unknown, Iruka convinces himself, that makes his pulse a little too fast and the room a little too warm. Like how women sometimes gossip about what they think Kakashi looks like under his mask. 

It occurs to Iruka that he could probably ask Anko.

He knows he won’t.

“Wolverine.” Kakashi answers, and Iruka’s eyes dart up to him. He had nearly forgotten his own question. The blistering heat, lack of sleep, his ANBU’s return, and Kakashi’s proximity, all combine to make Iruka feel nearly lightheaded. The sudden elevation of his pulse doesn’t help. “Summons.” Kakashi continues. Kakashi’s eye is gray like steel, flecks of black and lighter silver in the iris. He wonders if the sharingan holds half that beauty. Then he quickly looks back down at his own hands, the faint glow of healing chakra there.

The mention of the wolverine reminds Iruka of Kakashi’s comment concerning dogs and he latches onto the conversational segue. “Ah. You have ninken, right, Kakashi-san?” 

“Mm. Eight of them. No doubt they’ll make fun of me for getting beat up by a wolverine, the brats.” Kakashi sighs, and Iruka chuckles. It’s the first real sign of humility Iruka has seen, other than the false airs specifically designed to get him out of trouble with either Guy or Iruka. 

It’s… almost nice, to see a bit of the man behind the shell. Or, perhaps more accurately, a Hatake Kakashi whose life goal (at least at the moment) doesn’t seem to be pissing Iruka off. Iruka feels comfortable enough now to let the silence hang, focusing on keeping his healing chakra steady as the torn flesh knits itself back together. He thinks he should tell his ANBU about his progress with healing jutsu, now that he’ll have the chance. 

After a few minutes, Kakashi takes his turn to start the conversation. “You seem to be in a good mood today, Iruka-sensei.” 

Iruka is surprised Kakashi noticed or cared to comment, but not about the fact of the observation itself. A small smile twitches at his lips. It won’t be too many hours now until his ANBU might show. “Do I?” He asks noncommittally as he brushes flecks of dried blood from the cut, checking to make sure the skin has healed neatly. It looks good, worlds better than what he’d done for his ANBU in roughly the same amount of time. He turns Kakashi’s arm, focusing on another set of marks that cut vertically along the underside. The skin there is a creamy white and has fewer scars, nearly unblemished under Iruka’s palm. His veins are a light blue beneath his skin, and Iruka has the urge to trace them with his fingertips. He doesn’t.

“Well, you haven’t shouted or called me lazy yet.” Kakashi notes, quite reasonably. “I think you might be losing your touch.” 

“Do you want me to shout at you, Kakashi-san?” The words are ones Iruka would use on his students to frighten them into submission, but the raised eyebrow and the smile playing at Iruka’s lips are playfully teasing. His good mood really must be affecting him.

“Maa,” Kakashi clears his throat, eye darting away from Iruka’s as he continues airily. “Everyone needs hobbies.” 

“And your hobby is pissing me off.” Iruka snorts with a shake of his head. He can’t quite muster up the annoyance that he knows should be coloring his tone, amusement leaking through instead. “That explains a lot.” 

Actually, it explains something that he’s never taken a large amount of time to consider before. Iruka is well aware that the majority of the village holds him in mixed regard. His coworkers, both at the academy and the mission desk, seem to have no problems with him, at least after his initial reign of terror attempting to retrain the desk staff ended. Those who he knew as children tend to treat him warmly, despite his early proclivity for pranks. The elderly also seem to have a particular fondness for Iruka, for some reason of which he isn’t entirely aware, and he often gets roped into conversations at the market or given small freebies along with his purchases. 

But the rest of the village? Even apart from the shinobi who Iruka causes trouble for by insisting on clear, legible, and informative reports, there’s another reason why Iruka is less than perfectly tolerated. 

Over the last two years, his fondness for the Kyuubi’s jinchuuriki has been noticed. 

Iruka tries not to publicly treat Naruto differently than his other students. It’s specifically because of the restrictions placed on teacher’s interaction with children outside of class that Iruka can’t give Naruto even a fraction of the attention he actually needs. But he also can’t leave the boy alone entirely, not when he doesn’t have anyone else. So Iruka tries to teach him responsibility and self-control, to give him the discipline that will make him into a shinobi who can prove the entire village wrong. He’ll have to be strong to survive in a world in which he’s hated and scorned for something beyond his control.

He takes Naruto to _Ichiraku_ ’s on the worst days, or as a reward for the rare times he really listens to what Iruka has to say. It isn’t much, not nearly as much as he wants to do. He likes the kid, even beyond basic empathy and human decency that should have any adult desire to help a child in need. Naruto is loud, rambunctious, and short-sighted. He has trouble understanding anyone else’s point of view, and to be perfectly honest, he isn’t likely to excel academically, although Iruka would never admit to that aloud. But Naruto has _heart_. He’s dedicated, and passionate, and when he’s not trying to cause trouble, he’s a good kid. He treats everyone as an equal, even when they rarely do the same for him. 

The rest of the village doesn’t see Naruto’s potential. They don’t see how hard he can work when he really puts his mind to something. They don’t see how he tries to cheer up his classmates when they’re down, even though he normally fails miserably and causes more harm than good. They don’t see him scarfing down a bowl of ramen like it’s the best thing he’s ever had in his life, because it probably _is_. The rest of the village doesn’t see _Naruto_. They see the jinchuuriki, the Kyuubi that destroyed their village and killed their families. 

But Iruka has never once felt the Kyuubi’s chakra. He’s never once seen Naruto be intentionally cruel. He’s never once seen _anything_ but a desperately lonely child who deserves all the love and affection that he’s never known. Iruka hates the Kyuubi, with all of his soul, but Naruto isn’t the Kyuubi. 

Iruka thinks that the Sandaime might have played a part ensuring Iruka taught Naruto’s class. He doesn’t know that, but he remembers the small smile on the Sandaime’s lips, the pleased gleam in his eye, when Iruka first complained about Naruto’s pranks. A smile that grew when Iruka admitted that Naruto was a sweet kid, despite his worse traits. Iruka thinks the Sandaime cares, more than he admits, and perhaps he had known that despite the suffering Iruka experienced due to the Kyuubi, he would have the basic ability to differentiate between human and fox, child and beast.

The rest of the village doesn’t. They shun Naruto, ignore him, tell their children not to play with him, and sometimes Iruka just wants to take a loud speaker and demand anyone who would treat a child like that to step the fuck up and fight him, because it’s _infuriating_. It’s heart-wrenching. When Iruka hears the whispers that surround Naruto, when he sees the glares thrown at himself when he treats the boy to a simple meal, he wishes he could just hug the kid and never let go except to massacre those who would dare hurt him. Naruto’s a _child_ , and he’s never known more than contempt. 

Iruka doesn’t care about the rumors that surround himself. He knows they exist, hears them occasionally, but they’re mostly tampered down by the people in the village who knew Iruka long before the jinchuuriki entered his class. Iruka doesn’t suffer much for it, nothing much worse than the occasional cold shoulder or whisper. He rarely even thinks about it for long. But he knows the village is split down the middle, half-fond and half-derisive. He knows that he should count himself lucky to have had a good reputation before all of this started, because otherwise, he might not even have the friends and support he does now.

Hatake Kakashi, as far as Iruka is aware, has never had anything to do with Naruto one way or another. Considering he was in ANBU for at least several years, rumored to be over a decade, he likely wasn’t in the village often enough to care. But Iruka still assumed Kakashi disliked him, for his staunch refusal of poor attempts at scrolls if nothing else. While Kakashi was always outwardly polite, he was also distant, never saying more than necessary and always including at least a small error on his reports, something for Iruka to complain to him about. While Iruka consciously hadn’t given much consideration to these actions, he presumed Kakashi fell into the category of jounin who didn’t like being reprimanded and that his reports were discreet, passive-aggressive acts of rebellion. It doesn’t bother Iruka much. It isn’t completely unheard of for people to express their ire for him in this manner, although Kakashi makes more of a concentrated effort than most.

Now, Iruka realizes that he’s been a bit of an idiot. He hasn’t been taking into account Kakashi’s personality—what little he knows of it, anyway. Kakashi carries porn around with him like a shield. He drawls and slouches and has a reputation for being aloof to everyone, fellow jounin or not. The only person he’s known to tolerate is Might Guy, a man who most people avoid on principle. To everyone else, Kakashi is uncaring to the point of being called cold. Even Anko, who has been sleeping with the man for years (albeit infrequently) says he doesn’t have friends, and yet Iruka knows she wouldn’t bed a shinobi she detested on a personal level. She might be what his elderly neighbor would call promiscuous, but she has standards. 

Given all of these things, it seems obvious that Kakashi wouldn’t resort to passive-aggressive techniques if he was genuinely frustrated with Iruka. The Copy-nin’s reputation wouldn’t be harmed if he picked a fight with Iruka publicly, but more than that, Kakashi _avoids_ people. Even finding him hiding in a tree rather than going to the hospital is indicative of an introverted, socially-averse personality. Yet his constant mistakes on his reports (which Iruka _knows_ are purposeful; that tautological monstrosity had been utterly flawless apart from the headache-inducing repetition) only serve to ensure interaction with Iruka. Kakashi could easily drop his reports off with another chuunin, attempt to use his status to frighten Iruka into submission (which wouldn’t work, but that’s never stopped people from trying), or just turn in decent reports to begin with and avoid both the social contact and the effort of fixing them. 

Instead, he always chooses Iruka’s line at the desk, and while he’s never said a word outside of necessity, he actively works to bait Iruka. Yet the constant, small irritants never do real harm. It’s more like Kakashi’s... poking at a cat to see if it scratches. Looking at their interactions now, adding the factors of Kakashi’s acceptance of Iruka’s help and his comment about hobbies, Iruka wonders if Kakashi’s bolloxed mission reports aren’t intended to be playful rather than aggravating. A strange sort of repartee rather than a deliberate nuisance. And now he’s even attempting a genuine conversation. 

So… does Kakashi not dislike Iruka at all, but just derive a weird kick from his annoyance?

Huh.

“Did something good happen, sensei?” 

There’s another point in the favor of the brand new Kakashi-actually-doesn’t-mind-Iruka theory: he always uses Iruka’s proper title, and as far as Iruka can recall (and he’s fairly certain he would), Kakashi has never brought up their difference in rank. 

Lightly brushing Kakashi’s skin with his thumb, he once more tests how the healing has taken and uses the work as an excuse to not meet Kakashi’s eye. He doesn’t know what to make of this recent revelation, and he can’t discuss his ANBU explicitly, so he tries to seem nonchalant when he replies. “I guess you could say that.” 

His avoidance of Kakashi’s gaze leads him to notice a thin slice in the fabric of the man’s flak jacket, perhaps two inches long. There’s a faint discoloration like a remnant of blood, but the shirt beneath is intact. “Take off your vest, please.” Iruka leans back, giving Kakashi space to move. He doesn’t immediately, looking down at himself as if surprised to see the tear. 

“I bandaged that one. It’s a few days old.”. 

“Let me take a look at it. Unless you would rather go to the hospital?” No shinobi who enjoys hospital stays lasts long, and he doubts Kakashi is any exception. 

He’s proven correct when Kakashi hesitates for a moment, and then relents.”You drive a hard bargain, sensei.” He says, rolling down his shirt sleeve before shrugging out of his vest. 

When he lifts the hem of his shirt, Iruka sees alabaster skin and a network of finely laced scars that cross his body, most of them long since healed. His abdominals are clearly defined, with more musculature than Iruka expected given his tall, thin build. The hair on his lower torso is fine and silver, nearly invisible against the pale shade of his skin. They darken to a light gray as they grow thicker beneath his navel, disappearing into the waist of his pants. Blue bruises just beginning to darken into purple litter his stomach, evidence of a recent altercation gone wrong. Their hue stands out starkly, drawing Iruka’s eyes, and it’s a long moment before he focuses on the square bandage taped across Kakashi’s right side. The jounin reclines back, resting his weight on his elbow so that Iruka has more space to deal with the wound itself.

Iruka thinks it ironic that, for all that Kakashi may have ties with canines, his lithe body, long muscles, the deadly precision behind every movement, all speak to a large, predatory feline, keen eyes watching an approaching human to determine if they’re prey or too unimportant to bother killing. 

Iruka’s willing to say that, even marred by the marks of his recent mission, Anko’s ‘hot as hell’ is a significant understatement. 

A flush starts to rise to his cheeks, so Iruka hurriedly leans forward, ducking his head to hide it. If he’s lucky, Kakashi will attribute any unusual coloring to the heat of the day. It’s sweltering even in the last days of summer. Sweat beads on Iruka’s neck and forms a barely noticeable sheen on Kakashi’s skin, a hint of moisture against Iruka’s fingertips as he peels back the tape. Kakashi’s abdominals tense at the touch, either a reaction to Iruka’s likely uncomfortable proximity or lingering pain. He relaxes as Iruka removes the bandage. 

This cut is obviously worse than the others, made by a thin blade and lacerating deep enough to leave a scar. It’s been well cleaned and doesn’t quite necessitate stitches. “It’s healing well, but I’ll help some so you don’t have to bandage it again.” Iruka says, setting the used bandage down beside him and raising his hands to hover above the wound, focusing intently on channeling the appropriate chakra. 

He keeps his attention focused, refusing to allow his thoughts to stray in an unwanted direction. The healing helps with that, as he’s still not proficient enough to maintain it without a good deal of focus. The evidence of that comes when the fluttering in Iruka’s stomach proves enough of a distraction that, for a single moment, his hands waver, fingertips brushing lightly against Kakashi’s flesh. Their breath hitches in unison and Kakashi’s muscles jump, an involuntary nerve response to some pain Iruka must have inadvertently triggered.

“Sorry.” Iruka murmurs an apology, wincing at his mistake as heat of the less welcome kind floods his face. He’s vividly reminded of that time as a genin, when he healed his ANBU and made an even worse mistake, then through inexperience rather than nervousness. 

Leaning back as soon as he finishes, Iruka takes a moment to ensure the wound is as close to healed as he can make it. A faint pink line remains, nearly matching the scratches to which Iruka already attended. “All done.” He decides, taking the bandage and tape to dispose of in the trash can beside the door.

Iruka can hear the soft rustle of fabric and a zipper being pulled closed. “Thank you, Iruka-sensei. I appreciate it.” Kakashi says, and he sounds sincere, or as close to it as Iruka has ever heard him. If only he could put as much genuine effort into his reports.

An idea occurs to Iruka then, mischief quirking his lips. “No problem, I don’t mind helping.” He turns around to face Kakashi. “But… If you want to thank me, there is something you could do.”

“Oh?” Kakashi’s eye widens minutely and he tilts his head, eye roaming Iruka’s face as if searching for intent. Cautious. 

Iruka’s smile grows and he leans forward. Kakashi’s gaze rises to meet his. “Mhm. Turn in your mission report on time, intact, and legible.” Kakashi’s eyebrow rises, although with most of his face covered it’s hard to tell if it’s in surprise or skepticism. Iruka allows a hint of challenge to creep into his tone. “Or is that asking too much of you, Kakashi-san?”

For a moment, Iruka thinks Kakashi’s going to wave him off. Then his eye narrows and he regards Iruka with amusement in his voice. “I think I can manage that, Iruka-sensei.”

By the time Iruka arrives at the memorial stone, the air is cooling and the sun is sinking beneath the tops of the trees. He uses his mother’s technique as soon as he arrives, feeling almost like a child again with his impatient eagerness, but he’s unsurprised when he finds nothing. He sits in front of the memorial, prepared for a long night, and closes his eyes. He doesn’t have much new to tell his parents, not that he hasn’t already, so he spends more time reliving memories than speaking to them. 

His mother brewing tea. His father’s barking laugh. Grandfather clocks and lipstick smiles. 

After waking from the nightmares, Iruka feels only pain, loss, grief. His memories are tainted with the bitter, inescapable knowledge that he’ll never experience that warmth again. 

At some point, perhaps around the time he became aware of his ANBU watching, Iruka realized what he was doing. Realized that he never thought of his parents without associating with them the trauma of their deaths. Realized that he wasn’t doing justice to their memory, not really. So he tried hard to change, to remember his parents as they were: happy, and loving, and full of life. Sometimes he fails and tears slip from his cheeks to glisten on the grass at his knees. But often, he finds peace. Comfort, if not happiness. 

Not after his nightmares. Never then. But in front of the memorial stone… it’s possible.

So he thinks of his parents and he does his best to focus on those times in which he felt the most content and cheerful, looking forward to each new day. But thoughts of his ANBU are there, too, and as the day wears on, sunset slipping into night and moonlight bringing with it the gleam of stars, Iruka finds it harder to focus. Anxious anticipation builds in his muscles and he checks the forest often, too often. 

It’s late into the night when Iruka’s bed welcomes him, and he’s half-numb with the depletion of his chakra. He has greater control than he used to, is able to perceive minute discrepancies in the reaction of his chakra to other’s, but he still isn’t as strong as his mother. He will probably never be.

Iruka knew it was a longshot, knew his ANBU wouldn’t be able to come every night. But disappointment clogs his throat and when Iruka falls asleep, it’s with an ache in his chest that he only hopes tomorrow will fill.

If Iruka’s students (and Kakashi) believed him to be in an excellent mood before, his pupils certainly notice the contrast in his reserved demeanor the next day. His coworkers don’t. He tries not to snap at those who dawdle in the mission room, and he mostly succeeds, but he checks the clock incessantly, waiting impatiently for his shift to end. He rarely goes to the memorial stone after working the desk, but he will tonight, if only briefly. Just to check. He tries to tell himself that, after a year alone, he can certainly go another day or three without seeing his ANBU again. But that doesn’t stop his fixation with the clock on the opposite wall. 

The only distraction of the night influential enough to tear Iruka’s attention back to the mission room is when Kakashi enters his line. It takes several seconds for it to register in him why the sight is so unusual, as he’s become accustomed over the last few months to Kakashi’s constant appearance in the mission room. At first, nothing seems amiss. Then Iruka realizes that he can see the entirety of Kakashi’s face. 

Well, including the mask, obviously. But there’s no bright orange cover obscuring the sight of everything below his eye, merely the dark fabric that always rests across the bridge of his nose. Kakashi smiles, his eye curving into a happy little arch, and the events of the previous day come back to Iruka in a flood. After the initial, flustering image of Kakashi’s pale skin laid bare, he recalls the request he made at the end of the event.

He watches warily as Kakashi moves forward in the cue. He takes too long to look over the mission reports of those in the line before him, with the vain hope that Kakashi might move to one of the other chuunin and subject them to whatever disaster he’s intending to inflict. Iruka can’t interpret the curve of his eye as anything but anticipatory, sadistic glee. Iruka drums his fingers against the desk nervously as he scans a report, stopping when Sayuri gives him an odd look. Her line comes open and hope surges, Iruka is finally free—

Kakashi doesn’t move from his spot, slouching leisurely and giving no indication that he’s in any hurry. 

That just confirms Iruka’s worst fears. When the jounin reaches his desk, he hesitates before reaching out for the scroll, taking it carefully between his thumb and forefinger. 

“Hello, Iruka-sensei.” Kakashi greets, chipper innocence paving the way for Iruka’s downfall by causing a very small, miniscule amount of hope to trickle into his consciousness. _Maybe_ Kakashi actually did as he asked. _Maybe_ Iruka’s assistance generated enough good will in his favor to convince Kakashi to give him at least one pristine, eloquent report. _Maybe_.

“Good afternoon, Kakashi-san.” Iruka replies on auto-pilot, attention fully focused on the scroll before him as he gingerly releases the catch. He’s relieved when it opens to reveal neat script rather than an entire page of crude illustrations, as he had half-expected. The name is correct, as well, the kana neater than normal. The hope surges, growing with every line he reads.

Iruka can hear the smile in Kakashi’s voice. “On time, intact, and legible.”

At first, it truly seems as if nothing’s amiss, each penstroke precise and clean, grammatically correct, even the content filled with _detail_. Then Iruka’s gets to section 2-A and his eyes widen, as if it’ll change the script into one he can read. It’s… well, Iruka’s fairly certain it’s a dialect common to the Land of Lightning, but he only recognizes a few words here and there, generally consistent with the theme of the report (kunai, attack, when). His gaze slips up to check but no, Kakashi’s mission had definitely been within Konoha’s borders, an A-rank requested by a lord low in the Daimyo’s cabinet. 

Hope takes a nosedive when section 3-A begins a new language, this one even more obscure, something that Iruka has a vague suspicion, from the wavy script and copious vowels, could be from Water Country. He doesn’t bother attempting to decipher the words this time (couldn’t have even if he tried), skimming the rest of the content as horrified, enraged heat suffuses his face. 4-A’s language of choice hails from Wind, and Iruka can’t even guess as to the origins of the last, but it’s certainly not anything native to Konoha.

Iruka looks up, mouth opening and air gathering in his lungs in preparation for a well-deserved rant, but Kakashi’s already sitting on the open windowsill, prepared to jump out but watching eagerly for Iruka’s reaction. The _fucking bastard_.

“Kakashi-san!” Iruka bellows, fairly well vibrating with indignant fury. His chair legs screech as he pushes back, making it to standing just as Kakashi gives a jaunty wave and jumps out the window. Iruka has more than half a mind to climb over the desk to follow when Sayuri interrupts timidly.

“Ah, Iruka-sensei? What’s wrong with this one?”

Iruka turns to her, and only feels a hint of guilt when she shrinks at his glare. “It’s in five different languages!”

Kotetsu has the nerve to laugh, so he receives the rolled-up scroll to his face.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Obviously a good portion of the dialogue here is taken from Chapter 1 of the Naruto manga. Namely, everything between Iruka/Naruto/Mizuki, and the first two lines of his meeting with the Hokage. 
> 
> This is the longest chapter I've ever published, and I absolutely could have broken this into two, but the only part I really felt like breaking it at would have resulted in one 7k chapter and another 2k, which is just weird, so. Here you go, all at once! I would love some feedback about this, because there are some strange aspects in the canon chapter (like Mizuki telling Naruto the location and yet Iruka immediately finding him) that I tried to address and explain here, and some more explanations (like that weird shack?) will come next chapter. I hope you all enjoy!

Summer turns into fall, and Iruka’s ANBU never appears. There’s disappointment, of course, nearly as strong as the elation he felt that first day after the revelation that his ANBU was, at least, alive. After the disappointment comes confusion, but that state only lasts a few weeks before the season changes once more and winter arrives, bringing with it snow, sleet, and a veritable hailstorm of icy resentment. 

Iruka’s ANBU came back. Of that much, Iruka is absolutely certain. No one else would have reason to take the tanzaku, let alone carve that message into the branch. Iruka is also certain that, even in ANBU, a shinobi would be given more than a few days of leave after a year-long mission. So, there are only a few possibilities. Either his ANBU was sent out on an emergency mission lasting for several months, he coincidentally died right after leaving the message for Iruka, or he decided to stop visiting the memorial stone when Iruka is present. The idea of him never visiting at all is unconscionable, unthinkable.

As much as he hates to believe it, the last option is the most likely. It hurts. Not because Iruka believes that his ANBU owes him anything, and not even because Iruka feels as though he’s wasted years on someone who doesn’t even care to see him again, because he _doesn’t_. Regardless of how his ANBU feels, Iruka was helped by his presence. Having someone to talk to, having someone listen and provide even silent, worldless comfort, kept him going when he felt truly alone. That can’t change no matter who his ANBU is or how he feels about Iruka. 

It hurts because Iruka wants to believe that he was able to do something in return, that there was at least some small, miniscule aspect of their relationship that was reciprocal. The idea of taking so much without giving anything makes Iruka feel sick. He wants to think of himself as a good person. He wants to help people, he _does_. That’s why he decided to become a teacher full-time rather than rejoining field missions. He thought he could do more good that way, help someone rather than killing them. It’s the reason he puts up with Mizuki despite recognizing that the person he’s become is jaded and selfish. He still has some vain, idealistic notion that he can help. That, as long as he’s patient, as long as he shows Mizuki that Iruka’s there for him, eventually things will change. Iruka will be able to do some good. 

If his ANBU doesn’t want to see him, then Iruka must not have helped him at all.

He wants to help people. His students, his friends, his ANBU. 

Things never quite work out that way. 

Kakashi is the same as before. He turns in mission reports with ridiculous errors and lets Iruka berate him for it, but nothing more. It’s a fragile routine. It feels like bated breath, like a balanced seesaw, like they’re standing on the precipice of something more. An actual conversation, perhaps, like real human beings and functioning adults tend to have. But Kakashi always leaves without saying a word, and Iruka can’t justify asking the deadliest shinobi in Konoha to have drinks with him on the grounds that his mission reports suck. 

Perhaps he could find a way to approach the man slowly, work their way up to a civilized “How are you?” before considering even such lofty a goal as friendly acquaintanceship. (Iruka might have a slight, overwhelming interest in more, but he doesn’t want to fool himself. He has strong evidence Kakashi isn’t gay, and he’d implode from spontaneous combustion before asking Anko if he might swing both ways. Even then, Iruka doesn’t see any reason why Kakashi would be interested in _him_. Iruka is firmly average in all categories, and Kakashi tops the chart in every single one. The absolute best he could hope for is that Kakashi’s interest in him might go skin deep.)

But Iruka doesn’t have the patience to play games. Not now. Not when he’s using all of his spare time to haunt the memorial, waiting for his ANBU to show up so he can… well, Iruka doesn’t know. At this point, he’s starting to accept that they’ll never have whatever they did before. His ANBU doesn’t want that. Iruka just needs to know the guy’s alive. He thinks, if he can know for absolute certain, he’ll be able to give up entirely and never again check for more than ghosts at the memorial stone.

The start of January sees a return to the academy and added pressure, for both the students and teachers, to prepare for the upcoming graduation exams. Iruka’s class is actually exceptionally competent, considering some of the other classes he’s helped with over the years. The baby boom after the last war saw children born from many of Konoha’s most prominent clans, meaning Iruka has several students in his class that are almost certain to pass. Not because children from prominent families are inherently more talented, as some would assert, but because they were trained at home from a very young age, both in general shinobi arts and often family-specific jutsu such as with the Yamanaka or Nara clans. Add all of that to the naturally larger chakra reserves that often run in major families, and they have a significant leg up. Iruka is confident, however, that even his students who are children of civilians will be able to pass the graduation exam. Now, whether they’re able to exceed their jounin-sensei’s requirements to join a genin team… that isn’t up to Iruka, but he can hope. 

There is one student who he fears might never graduate, and it isn’t for lack of trying on Iruka’s part. 

Painting the Hokage’s stone faces is low, even by Iruka’s ten-year-old self’s standards. Naruto has never been known for making excellent choices, but this time he’s really gone too far. The last thing Iruka wants to do after a full day teaching gremlins is to sit on a hard rock while Naruto scrubs the evidence of his vandalism away. It’s the night before the exams, Iruka has three year’s worth of effort riding on his first class’ graduation, and his (admittedly favorite but) most stubborn pupil is trying to get flayed alive by the village and turning into porn-worthy naked girls (and doesn’t he want to know why Naruto thought that was a good technique to learn) rather than trying to pass. If he would just put in a few days worth of effort, he could succeed. Iruka knows it. He has talent. He’s just a damn idiot in using it.

“You don’t leave here until every drop of paint is gone!” Iruka tells him, even though it means he’ll have to stay for however long it takes, too. That’s one thing Iruka never understood until he became a teacher himself; punishing students is exhausting and only takes time away from what little personal life instructors manage to have. If they do it, it’s for the kid’s own good, not because they’re vindictive assholes. Iruka would rather grade papers than watch Naruto scrub the faces any day. 

“So?” Naruto scowls, scrubbing at the wall with nearly enough force to grind off the Yondaime’s nose. “It’s not like there’s anyone waiting at home for me.” 

Iruka can’t count the number of times he’s thought that exact same thing. 

Breathing in deeply, he turns up his face and releases his frustrations to the moon. There’s a time to shout, a time to discipline and try to teach Naruto what no one else cared enough to. There’s a time to try to shape Naruto into a true shinobi, someone who’s strong enough to fight against all that oppose him, mental and physical, because they’ve been taking bites out of him for years, nipping at his heels, trying to wear him down to gravel, and that won’t magically stop whether or not Naruto wears the Konoha crest.

But if there’s one thing Iruka’s ANBU has taught him, it’s that strength isn’t something that has to be formed alone or forged in fire. It’s built from the ground up, and sometimes others are the mortar that holds the bricks in place.

“Naruto…”

The boy grimaces and looks up at him, waiting for a reprimand. “Now what?” He asks. His shoulders are stiff, anticipating the next blow to fall, resentment and resignation as clear in his eyes as the goggles on his face.

Maybe Iruka could sometimes be a bit too harsh. Just a smidgen. “Well… Once you’re through here, I’ll...” Iruka scratches his scar, trying to find a way to apologize without actually saying the words. “We could…” Well, there’s at least one thing he knows Naruto always appreciates. “I’ll buy you a bowl of ramen.” 

Naruto’s face lights up like he’s just received the best present in the entire world, and the warmth that suffuses Iruka’s chest is matched only by the pang of mourning that accompanies it. 

This is it. This is all Naruto has to look forward to. 

“Yeah, baby!” He cries, pumping a fist in the air with glee. “Talk about motivation!”

_Ichiraku_ is still open when they arrive, though just barely. Iruka discretely slips Teuchi a few extra coins as a thank you for keeping the lights on a few minutes longer. They don’t only go to _Ichiraku_ because it’s cheap and fast (though that’s a large reason, since Iruka hasn’t taken a real mission in ages and they pay far better than his meager teacher’s salary), but because Teuchi is one of the few business owners who welcomes Naruto with open arms. Teuchi takes pride in his creations, no matter the price they’re sold at, and so anyone who appreciates them--like Naruto does with gusto--is in his good book, jinchuuriki or not. 

Watching Naruto slurp the steaming hot noodles, Iruka pauses for a moment, looking down at the green onions swirling in his broth.

“Naruto…”

“Hmm?” Naruto can’t form real words around the pork crammed in his mouth like stuffing in a goose. Iruka’s grateful he doesn’t try.

“Why, of all places, did you choose to deface that spot? I mean, you do know who the Hokage is, right?” He should. Iruka has given his class enough homework about the Hokages that Sakura might be able to recite the Shodaime’s list of favorite teas in order of preference.

“Of course! To inherit the Hokage name, he’d have to have been the best shinobi in the village. It was the Yondaime who saved our town by finding a way to beat the Kyuubi.” Naruto says the last word with the ease of ignorance. Iruka’s gotten good at hiding his reaction over the years, but he turns his eyes to his own bowl. Just in case.

He’s glad none of the students knew or cared about who Iruka lost that day. Most of them don’t even realize Iruka was alive at the time, abstracting their teacher as an entity that has never existed outside of the academy building. It’s easy that way, for them and Iruka.

“Ok, then… why?”

A huge grin splits Naruto’s face, determination shining in his eyes, and Iruka only wishes the brat could apply a modicum of that resolve to his homework. “Because one of these days, they’ll be calling me the Hokage! I’m going to surpass everyone who came before me! And when that day comes, everyone in the village will have to give me some respect at last!” 

Iruka stares, throat dry and crumbly like he’s choking on sand. It’s not the revelation that Naruto wants to be the Hokage--Iruka’s heard him say that before, more times than he can count--but his last sentence that cements Iruka to the spot.

That was all Naruto ever wanted: recognition. That was all Iruka had wanted, too, once upon a time. It’s what every mammal craves, from the stray dogs that Iruka still needs to the Hokage himself. Naruto’s need is desperate and unfulfilled. More than that, what gets Iruka is that he doesn’t even understand that most people would feel shame in admitting that. To Naruto, it’s such an immutable fact of his existence that it’s as core to his being as the yellow hair on his head. While Iruka had shed his tears at the memorial stone so he could go to school shielding his grief with a stretched-taut grin and a barking laugh, Naruto has absorbed it into himself, so entirely that he allows it to define him without a second thought.

“By the way, sensei…” Naruto clapped his palms together, bowing his head in false modesty. “I need a favor.”

Iruka can respond on instinct, as many times as this has happened before. “Another bowl of ramen?”

Naruto voice is innocent and cotton candy sweet. It’s enough to rouse Iruka’s teacher instincts for troublemaking, familiar suspicion dispelling the worst of his thoughts even as Naruto tips his head politely. “Uhh, your hitai-ate… pretty please?” 

“My…” Iruka reaches up subconsciously, adjusting the cloth. “This? No, not yet. No way.” Iruka sees the opportunity for a teaching moment, and though he hasn’t been able to inspire Naruto to do his homework more than the bare minimum in four years of education, he’s never given up trying. “It’s a badge of adulthood. You don’t get one until you graduate!”

Naruto groans loudly, comical in the depths of his letdown. “What a rip-off!” 

Iruka laughs, finding his voice again in the sheer grumpy annoyance of Naruto’s expression. “So that’s why you took your goggles off!”

In many ways, Naruto is far more honest than Iruka ever has been. He hopes that never changes. 

Out of twenty-seven students, twenty-six of them graduate. That’s over ninety-six percent, someone tells Iruka as if in congratulations. It’s meant that way. There hasn’t been a graduation rate so high since the end of the last war, when children were being sent to fight as soon as they could hold a kunai in chubby fists.

Those twenty-six matter. Iruka’s proud of them, so very proud. 

But nothing about this day is good. 

Out of those twenty-six, how many of them will die on the front lines? How many of the parents gathered in the courtyard to celebrate will have someone show up at their door, a bloody hitai-ate in hand as the only piece left? How many of these children will lose themselves in the horrors of battle, of taking another human life? How long until the next war is waged, until the next disaster strikes? How long until Iruka’s teachings fail them?

These aren’t new thoughts. Iruka’s always known that he’s training soldiers. He’s always known that, while he sees these children’s innocence, their bright eyes and selfish dreams, he’s also preparing them for when it all shatters, raining like glass upon young, upturned faces. 

Out of those twenty-six, only a third or so will even make genin this time around. Oh, the others will get second chances; they can’t afford to waste years of schooling on soldiers who never get to see a battle. Only a few of them, mostly the civilian children, will never become shinobi. They’ll take the genin test and fail. In a few months, they’ll fail again. Then once more, and eventually their spirits will be crushed and they’ll face the realization that they were never cut out for this world after all, no matter what grades they made on Iruka’s papers, no matter what comforting, inspiring words Iruka shared with them. It was all for naught. Maybe some of them will even blame Iruka for it. Maybe not. Iruka will blame himself if they don’t. 

It’s the one left out of those twenty-six who weighs most heavily on Iruka’s conscience--the one with whiskers on his cheeks and a smile like the sun and so much unfulfilled yearning it’s a wonder it can fit inside his tiny, bony body. Mizuki is Iruka’s assistant on the final exam, and he tries to convince Iruka to let Naruto pass. 

Iruka considers it for all of half-a-second, then he stands his ground because he knows the truth. He knows that, if Naruto is sent out into a war right now, if he faces opponents without even the skill to safely _escape_ , he’ll die before he can say ‘ramen’. Iruka cares about Naruto’s pride, Naruto’s happiness, Naruto’s dreams. He cares so, so much.

He cares about Naruto’s life more. 

Mizuki doesn’t understand. That’s probably why he doesn’t have his own class, Iruka thinks with bitter judgement, because why couldn’t Mizuki _think of someone else_ for once? He does what’s easiest for him, what he thinks will make him look good, and he doesn’t give a shit if these children are being sent to their deaths. He doesn’t care about the tender, shining hope that fills bright blue eyes and dies a crushing, wilting death, crumbling like cigarette ashes when Iruka says no. 

Sometimes, Iruka wishes he didn’t love Mizuki at all. If they met now, as adults, Iruka would have never given the man a second glance. But every image he sees is set in the frame of his childhood friend, the one who had kept him going those days when nothing else could. He sees the boy that made him sandwiches when he was too weighed down with despair to care about surviving another day. 

He misses that boy.

Naruto will get another chance. Iruka stares up at his bedroom ceiling, ears overflowing with the silence that surrounds him. There’s no blanket over his body to ward off the early spring chill, because the only comfort he wants to feel is scratchy and dusty and smells like soy sauce and dog fur, and with someone who Iruka will never see again for reasons he doesn’t understand. 

He’s talked to the Sandaime. Naruto has nowhere to go, nothing to be if not a shinobi. He’ll stay in the Academy until he’s thirteen, fourteen, however long it takes until he graduates. Iruka never did learn what exactly Hiruzen meant to say, because Iruka didn’t let him speak. He pleaded to be allowed to tutor Naruto outside the academy, begged the Sandaime to overrule the Headmaster, who sternly rejected it when Iruka made the same request months earlier, on grounds of it being against the academy’s policy. It probably is, and for good reason. Iruka doesn’t give a shit. 

The Sandaime had disagreed, at first. “I understand how you feel about the boy.” Drinking was the only time Iruka ever saw him without his signature pipe. The scent of tobacco still lingered, flat and heavy on Iruka’s tongue. “Growing up, like you, without his parent’s love…”

Iruka stared down at his fingers, white knuckled in their grip on his pants leg, and forced them to relax. He flipped his right hand over, revealing the calloused, brown skin of his palm, the junction between mind and fate lines where his mother’s jutsu welled.

“Respectfully, Hokage-sama…” Iruka looked up, jaw set and eyes hard. Hiruzen met him steadily. “It’s not the same at all. I had ten years with my parents. I carry their love and their memories with me every day. Naruto doesn’t have even that.”

Iruka stood, chair legs screeching against the hardwood. His own cup lay disregarded on the table, cold and forgotten. He tried to keep his tone even, respectful, and he wasn’t sure if he succeeded. “You’re the one who asked me to teach at the academy. You said you had confidence in me, and that I had the power to save lives without spilling blood. If that’s true, then please listen to me now. If Naruto continues like this, if he’s shunned by the village, treated with scorn and hatred, if we abandon him… He’ll die as surely as if he were sent off to war today. I know I can’t make people accept him. But I can help him. I can give him the tools he needs to become a shinobi of Konoha, if I’m allowed to.” 

Iruka believed in Naruto. His talent, his ability, his stubbornness, his enthusiasm. He had failed as Naruto’s teacher, and he would keep failing, if he could only treat Naruto as one in a sea of many. But that wasn’t all it had to be. “I don’t care about how anyone else feels; Naruto is one of us. If you really believe in the Will of Fire, then that makes him family. And I know you would never allow Konohamaru to be cast aside and left to die rather than risk upsetting the village.” Iruka was breathing hard, the effort of restraining his emotions taking a physical toll on him. But he knew his place, knew he was a chuunin academy teacher speaking to the man who had fought and led them through three wars. Iruka straightened his arms at his sides and bowed, red face parallel to the floor. “Please, Hokage-sama.”

There were several long moments of silence, in which Iruka’s pulse pounded in his ears and he braced himself for the worst, for a firm dismissal and an order to never speak of it again. The Sandaime had never treated him harshly before, never refused a request--but then again, Iruka had never made any. There was never anything important enough to him before. 

“If your parents were alive…” The Sandaime started, and the strong, acrid scent of smoke clogs Iruka’s lungs. He waited for the anvil to fall, eyes still on the ground. When the Sandaime finished, his tone was fond. “They would be very proud of you, Iruka.” 

Iruka looked up, heart in his throat. The Sandaime’s gaze twinkled in pride, wizened lips curled into a smile around his pipe. Pressure welled up behind Iruka’s eyes and he straightened when Hiruzen waved a hand to indicate he should. 

“It seems that, in caring for many, I have forgotten how to care for the one.” He looked down at his teacup, the gleam fading and an old, old pain taking its place. Sorrow. “You have never lost that power, Iruka, and I should hate for you to start now. I will speak to the Headmaster.” His tone is final, and Iruka recognized the dismissal. 

Now, staring at the ceiling and remembering Naruto’s downcast features as he watched the rest of his class graduate, the resentment in his tone as he cleaned the Hokage faces from the wall, Iruka hopes it isn’t too little, too late. 

Two knocks sound at his door, sharp and urgent. Iruka swings his legs over the side of the bed, long strides carrying him to his living room as alarm takes up residence in his chest. In a shinobi village, a late night visitor is rarely a good sign. He swings the door open to see Mizuki, green eyes wide and hair disheveled, breathing hard as if he had just run. “What’s up?” Iruka asks pressingly. He’s already looking above Mizuki, searching the sky for signs of smoke or fire or orange tails. 

“It’s Naruto.” Mizuki gasps, more emotion than Iruka has seen in years filling his voice with exigency. “He’s stolen the Scroll of Seals!”

Iruka’s world stops spinning, tilting on its axis and wobbling dangerously until only one side is bathed in light, one pinpoint thought flying through Iruka’s mind. 

_No. I’m too late. I can’t be too late._

Mizuki’s saying something else, something about search parties, but Iruka can’t hear him through the buzzing in his eardrums. He doesn’t ask questions, doesn’t hesitate. He steps two steps back inside, slings his flak vest over his shoulders, and shoves his feet in his boots. It only takes a few seconds, but Mizuki’s gone by the time Iruka’s wound the bandage for his kunai holster around his thigh. Iruka barely remembers to shut his door before he’s taking off, wracking his brain for anywhere that Naruto might go, dismissing each place that’s too public for Naruto to ensure privacy.

In the forest behind the academy grounds, Iruka’s found Naruto a few times before. Hiding when he doesn’t want to go home, waiting to start his latest prank, or, once, trying to conceal himself after skipping class. It’s a longshot, and Iruka hopes Naruto isn’t stupid enough to go there even as he hopes he is.

He starts using his mother’s technique the moment he nears the Academy. It’s hard to use while moving, both because of the difficulty concentrating and the wind causing a disruption in the fall of his chakra, but he tries. He gathers yang chakra in his palm, more than he ever has before, and senses as broad an area as he can. Nothing. He moves on, to the spot in the forest he’s found Naruto before. No one’s there, and he doesn’t have time to cross the village again to search nearer to Naruto’s apartment, so he keeps heading straight, deeper into the woods. He does his jutsu once, twice more, frantically searching every minute until there, at the very edge of his awareness, is Naruto. The relief that flows through Iruka’s veins is sweeter than the fall he nearly takes as he wobbles to the next branch, woozy with the rapid loss of chakra.

Iruka doesn’t even slow as he crashes to the ground before the bright orange blob, anger and confusion and fear and exhaustion warring together until it’s a miracle Iruka’s on his feet. “Gotcha,” he nearly shouts with relief as he sees the scroll on Naruto’s back. 

If he can get it back safely, maybe there’s a chance. Maybe Naruto can survive this.

Naruto stands, pointing at Iruka as if in triumph. “About time, nosebleed! I found you!” 

Iruka allows rage to win out. “No, you idiot! I found you!” 

Naruto grins a bit sheepishly, rubbing the back of his neck, and the action is so at odds with _stealing a forbidden scroll_ that Iruka can’t figure out how to react. “Heh, I guess you _have_ got me.” He laughs a little, though he’s visibly daunted by Iruka’s presence. He’s the only person Naruto has ever listened to, including their Hokage, and Iruka has never been more grateful for his student’s fear of him than now. 

There are dirt stains all over Naruto’s clothes, a few leaves in his hair, and he reeks of salty sweat. “Too bad you were so fast, I only memorized one technique.”

Iruka highly doubts Naruto has memorized anything out of the _fucking Scroll of Seals_. He wants to argue, but he bites his tongue at the last second, praying to his parent’s for strength. Iruka knows better by now than to confront Naruto immediately. If you want a kid to admit to doing something wrong, you don’t start by reprimanding before they’ve even told the truth. “You look exhausted. What have you been doing?”

“Just wait, I’ll show you! I never dreamed… some of this ninjutsu is so amazing!” His blue eyes light up in excitement, so genuine and pure that Iruka wants to shake the nescience from him. “If I show you these techniques, you’ll have to let me graduate!”

_What?_ Iruka stares in shock as Naruto clasps his hands together, squeezing his eyes tight as he concentrates. 

Iruka can barely breathe, because this is _exactly_ the Naruto he knows. So foolish and bold and rebellious, but working himself to exhaustion without a moment’s thought. When he finally finds his voice, Naruto trying in vain to gather enough chakra to do whatever the hell he’s been practicing, Iruka’s voice is thick with repressed emotion and fondness, but also what the fuck because he still has that fucking scroll on his back. “Naruto…”

“Yeah?” Naruto peers at him through one eye, holding his stupid stance like the jutsu will magically take effect any second now.

“What’s up with that scroll you’re carrying?” Iruka’s incredibly proud of how calm he sounds.

“What, this?” Naruto adjust the strap over his shoulder and looks back at it as if he’d nearly forgotten about it, as if there was another giant ass fucking scroll he had just stolen from the Hokage’s office. _Oh God, what if there was?_ “Mizuki-sensei told me about it, and about this place! He said if I could show you the techniques in this scroll, you’d let me become a shinobi!”

Iruka’s blood freezes. So many thoughts flit through his mind at once that they’re more vague images than defined words or ideas. Mizuki, eyes wide and sweat on his brow as he tells Iruka about Naruto’s crime. Mizuki, sneer colder than flint and words dripping with disdain and disgust. Mizuki, staring hungrily at Taiki who’s sniffling and sobbing, in a sinkhole that Iruka can barely see the remnant of over Naruto’s shoulder, a slight depression that never quite filled. 

Air stirs behind him and Iruka’s body reacts before his mind. He pushes Naruto aside and whips around, but he barely has time to bring his arms over his face before sharp pain bursts into existence on every facet of his person. He can’t count the wounds, can’t fathom anything but the bright, searing burns that feel like lava licking at his muscles and burying deep into his bones. He tries to gasp, but his lungs are still full with air and he wheezes instead. His eyes have rolled into the back of his head, and by the time he gets them to focus, he can’t even look down to see the kunai littering his torso, his arm, deep into the meaty flesh of his legs, pinning him to a shack that he had hardly noticed before. All he can see is a pair of green eyes and silver hair glowing around an expression so full of hatred that it pierces him more deeply than the kunai possibly can. 

“I’m impressed that you figured out where to go.” Mizuki says. 

_Mizuki remembers this place._ He chose it, chose the forest, chose the sinkhole, and even though Iruka hadn’t thought of it, hadn’t had a clue where he was headed and just followed his instincts and knowledge of Naruto to get here, he knows why Mizuki chose it.

This is the place where Iruka comforted Taiki. This is the place where Iruka told Mizuki he was wrong. This is the place where Iruka’s mother came for him, and Mizuki’s didn’t, couldn’t. 

This is the place where Mizuki’s descent began. 

“Now I understand.” Iruka croaks, and oh, how he wishes he didn’t. How he wishes he could see anything but malice and loathing in Mizuki’s eyes. 

How he wishes he had seen it fifteen years ago. 

“The scroll, Naruto.” Mizuki turns his attention away from Iruka, and somehow that stings more than the kunai. Iruka almost laughs at the thought. Then he realizes he might be going into shock. “Give it to me.”

“Dude! I mean, come on!” Naruto’s in shock, too. He’s on his ass where Iruka had pushed him, looking between Mizuki high in the tree and his teacher, pinned by a dozen blades to an empty shed, one that hadn’t been there when they were young. Iruka doesn’t know why it’s there, what it’s for, and he realizes he doesn’t want to look inside. “Hey, what _is_ this?!”

It‘s a good thing Iruka didn’t let him graduate, he has the presence of mind to think. Naruto didn’t stand a chance if he couldn’t even recognize the enemy. But Iruka’s starting to move past shock, sharp awareness cementing his focus as his eyes land on Naruto’s back, because there’s more to this than Iruka’s best friend betraying him and their village. There’s Naruto, his life, but even more than that, sitting behind Iruka’s eyelids, there’s the sadistic compulsion in Mizuki’s eyes while he watched Taiki sniffle snot and tears and blood. Iruka doesn’t know what’s in the shed, doesn’t know what’s in that scroll, doesn’t know how they came to this point, but he knows exactly what’s in Mizuki’s heart.

Iruka knows that there are more lives at stake here than their own. 

“Don’t let him have it, Naruto!” He gasps, sucking air through his lungs as his numb fingers grasp one of the kunai and pull it out from his chest, from the rib it had shattered. He can smell blood, but he can barely feel the kunai leaving his skin. His whole world is agony, but it’s dull, muffled like hearing through cotton, dampened by the adrenaline coursing through his veins. 

He yells as loudly as he can, vainly hoping someone might hear him, but he knows no one is close enough. It doesn’t matter. Iruka’s an optimist, always has been. He hopes. “Protect that scroll with your life! It’s more dangerous than you can imagine--” _Mizuki_ is more dangerous than Naruto can imagine, and Naruto’s still just sitting there on his fucking ass, staring at Iruka as if he’s a ghost. Iruka’s going to have to spell it out, even as he rips another blade from his muscle. “--it holds the records of a forbidden ninjutsu!” Only one of which does Iruka know, because the Sandaime himself told him when Naruto started in his class. “Mizuki used you because he wants it for himself!”

Naruto finally moves, struggling to his feet, but he’s slow and unsteady. He’s a wobbly foal beneath Mizuki’s predatory sneer. “Naruto,” Mizuki calls, lifting his chin and looking down at Naruto with the same look he used to use on Iruka--smug, like he’s superior, like Naruto only breathes through Mizuki’s good will. Unfortunately, at the moment, he’s right. “Even if you’ve read it, it will still be meaningless to you. I can show you what it means.”

_Mizuki knows, Mizuki knows_ , and even as Iruka dislodges one of the kunai in his gut, one that might have sliced his spleen (he can’t remember right now if he would be standing if that was true), Iruka splutters in desperation, as if there’s a shred of decency left in his friend’s body. “Sh-shut up, you idiot!” 

Naruto can’t know, Naruto can’t know, Iruka’s spent four years protecting him because Naruto _can’t know_. 

“You know what really happened in the incident where the Kyuubi was sealed twelve years ago, don’t you?”

Iruka wants to scream at Naruto to run, but he thinks maybe his spleen is nicked after all, because blood is spurting at an alarming rate and Iruka would have sank to his knees if there weren’t two kunai still pinning him to the wall of the shed. His vision’s whited out, but he gathers healing chakra in his hand, covering the wound with his palm and hoping beyond hope that it’s enough, that Mizuki won’t stop him. Mizuki’s always underestimated Iruka, always, and apparently that hasn’t changed, because he just keeps talking to Naruto. For a few long seconds Iruka can’t hear anything for the sound of his own wet, ragged breathing and the vicious blood loss, but then Naruto’s voice breaks through.

“What was the decree?” He sounds wide-eyed and scared and when Iruka’s vision starts to clear, his eyes confirm it. Naruto’s visibly shaking. Mizuki looks gleeful. “What?”

“That no one must ever tell you…” Mizuki’s voice is slick and pleased, sliding like oil into Iruka’s ears, like his chakra always had off of Mizuki’s skin. “That what you really are…” _God, there were so many signs, Iruka’s fucking blind_. “Is the Kyuubi.”

“What?” Naruto, always so loud and boisterous, can only speak in a whimper. Then panic takes over and he screeches, and Iruka’s glad someone’s trying to attract attention again, because he isn’t done stopping the bleeding yet. “What are you talking about?!”

Mizuki’s lips curl into a smirk and Iruka can envision him taking a bite, crunching on Naruto’s bones like a wolf on the spine of a rabbit. “Stop!” Iruka shouts, his broken ribs digging into his lungs with how forcefully he has to inhale to get the hoarse word out. 

“It was you who murdered Iruka’s family!” Mizuki’s grin is manic, stretching across his features, dripping like saliva from a rabid dog. “You’re the Kyuubi who attacked the village!” _Wrong, wrong, that was wrong, not Naruto--_ “Until the Yondaime trapped you in this form.” 

“Stop it!” Iruka doesn’t know if the words are even understandable, torn from his throat in a groan and wrapped in cords of fear and disgust and hatred almost as strong as Mizuki’s, because Naruto looks like he’s dying, trembling and skin leeched white and hyperventilating like he’s bleeding out worse than Iruka is.

“Since then, you’ve been made a fool of by everyone in town! Didn’t you think it was strange, being so despised everywhere you went?” Mizuki’s words are breathy with laughter. He reaches back, drawing a fuma shuriken from his back, a fuma shuriken that Iruka has helped him sharpen. “If he were honest, even _noble Iruka_ would admit he hates you, too!” 

There are still kunai in his body. He can’t tell if the internal bleeding has stopped or not, because he feels cold and hot and numb all over. The Kyuubi’s chakra is swirling like a noxious gas, the first Iruka has felt of it in twelve years. He remembers it clawing at his senses as he watched his mother die. But more than that, he sees the reality of it now, how it tears at Naruto’s flesh, how his fingers grow into claws and his hair stands on end and it looks like he’s suffocating, being enveloped by the vivid copper glow encasing his skin.

“No one will ever accept you.”

The Kyuubi isn’t Naruto. Naruto is desperate and lonely. Naruto is hopeful and eager to be acknowledged, even if it’s through hatred rather than love. Naruto is smiles to hide grimaces, squinty eyes to avoid tears, hot ramen to fill the empty ache in his gut. 

The fuma shuriken unfurls and spins, deft fingers that had once held Iruka’s hand now twirling cold metal that reeks of death. “That scroll that you’ve stolen? It was the instrument of your bondage.”

Naruto is precious. So precious. 

Iruka feels the Kyuubi’s chakra as he falls forward, feels it burn at his skin as he knocks Naruto down, shielding him with his own, broken body. Then he feels an impact, more pressure than pain, and his spine is crumpling in on itself. It’s all that he can do to keep from falling forward, because Iruka feels as though the blade has torn through his abdomen, eviscerating him, and he can’t let it impale Naruto if it has. 

Bright crimson drops bloom on Naruto’s skin, on his chubby cheeks and whiskers, and Iruka, for one terrible instant, thinks that he’s failed, that the fuma shuriken passed right through him and into Naruto. 

Then he realizes the blood is gushing from his own mouth, and suddenly he knows something else. Something he never hoped to learn.

He knows the relief that his mother felt as she watched Iruka being carried away. 

He knows the acceptance of death that comes when your loved ones are safe. 

He knows why she smiled as her life stained her mouth like lipstick.

But the blood dripping down Naruto’s cheeks mixes with salty tears, and Iruka remembers Naruto still isn’t safe. Not yet. Iruka was too late. He’s always too late, too late, too late, and Naruto’s trembling in fear because Iruka hadn’t, over three long years, given him the strength he needed to fight for himself. Iruka’s mother succeeded, but Iruka never has. He tried to give Naruto physical strength, physical weapons, but he hadn’t addressed the emotional wounds that dug their claws into his viscera, deeper every day. 

Naruto isn’t injured, could run away at any point, but he doesn’t. 

“I know that, Naruto…” Iruka can’t speak above a whisper, can’t force his ribs to expand enough to allow for a full inhalation, but he also can’t stop the words from falling, staining Naruto’s skin like the blood and the tears and the regret that fills him more than the fuma shuriken embedded in his very bones. “I was so hard on you, yelling, scolding. It must have hurt. Forgive me. If I had been a better teacher, a better person…” If he stopped Mizuki fifteen years ago, if he took Naruto for more than ramen... “Maybe neither of us would have come to this.”

A sound comes from behind him, a strange grunt or inhale from Mizuki. 

It occurs to Iruka that Mizuki hadn’t been trying to hit him, had been aiming for Naruto. It occurs to him that he hadn’t even killed Iruka when the teacher was pinned against the wall, ripping out kunai and healing himself. 

It occurs to Iruka that Mizuki is a _fucking coward_. 

Naruto runs, but the wrong way. He’s going deeper into the forest, away from the academy, away from anyone who could help. “Naruto!” Iruka gasps, and he tries to move, tries to tell him, but the fuma shuriken strikes a nerve cluster and Iruka body jerks beyond his control, keeping him from rising.

“Heh, what a pity.” There’s a soft thump and Iruka think Mizuki must have landed behind him, because his voice is closer when he speaks again. “But I’m afraid, when Naruto sets his mind on something, he can’t be dissuaded.”

Iruka doesn’t know what the hell that means, but he guesses it doesn’t matter. He’ll be dead in a moment. He tries to sit back, tries to reach for the fuma shuriken in his spine, but he’s fumbling and slow. He can’t stop Mizuki from slitting his throat. 

“He’s going to use the scroll to take his revenge on the village.” Mizuki gloats with a laugh, and it’s strange, but this is the first time in the entire encounter in which Iruka has sincerely questioned Mizuki’s sanity. “Did you see that look in your protege’s eyes? Those were the eyes of the demon fox.” 

If Mizuki is going to talk instead of killing him, Iruka’s going to keep fighting. He finally gets his hand around one of the blades and wrenches back as straight as he can, trying not to paralyze himself permanently. Or, more importantly, temporarily. He can’t kill Mizuki if he’s paralyzed. “You…” Iruka’s lungs are filled with lead and blood, but somehow they work, and somehow, Mizuki doesn’t stab him in the throat to stop that. _Oversight_. “Don’t know Naruto at all…”

Iruka can’t see Mizuki’s expression, but he can practically hear the scowl as Mizuki darts forward. “I don’t have to know the boy to kill him.” He looks back at Iruka, and there’s a strange conflict in his eyes that Iruka doesn’t give a shit about understanding. “It’s the scroll I’m after now. I’ll finish you later.” 

He disappears into the forest and Iruka has never felt the urge to draw another’s blood in his life, but now he does.

_You can try, you fucking coward_.

Iruka rips the remaining kunai from his muscles. Blood gushes forth, staining his clothes and the leaves on the ground, but it’s not as bad as it could be. Iruka thinks he can stand. He has to stand. Mizuki is fast, faster than Naruto. 

Not faster than Iruka. 

He’s dizzy, can’t even keep going in a straight line as he heads through the trees, but he doesn’t have to. He sets off his mother’s chakra in small bursts in his palm, as far as he can reach, and it takes nearly thirty seconds but Iruka finally feels it, the disgusting slide like oil that he’s associated with Mizuki for ten long years. He doesn’t have the chakra for another burst, can barely see beyond the blurring in his vision as it is, but he brings his fingers together in a clumsy seal. His transformation probably isn’t perfect, but it doesn’t matter. He knows these woods, knows the direction Mizuki is headed now, and it isn’t hard to get ahead of him. That’s all it takes for his former friend to fall into his trap.

Iruka hadn’t expected to hear his own voice behind him. His plan hadn’t included much, just Mizuki getting close enough to ‘Naruto’ to steal the scroll. But this was even better, because Mizuki wouldn’t expect the attack at all. 

“Quickly, give me the scroll! It’s what Mizuki’s after!” 

Landing on a tree branch, Iruka abruptly shifts his momentum. His ankle wrenches as it crumples under his body weight, so he doesn’t manage to get the clean hit he wanted, but the weight of his body is enough to throw Mizuki backwards. He doesn’t have time to block the attack, and he thuds messily on the hard dirt below. Iruka falls, too, and he even lands on his feet, but his ankle won’t support him and he goes tumbling backwards, skull and elbows colliding against the hard bark of a tree.

Iruka can’t tell if his head is bleeding now because his entire body is numb. It’s not cold so much as a total absence of heat, almost as if he isn’t alive at all. He tries to raise his arm, tries to force his ripped and torn muscles to obey, but they don’t. 

“You… What’s wrong, Naruto?” Iruka opens his eyes to see a puff of smoke swirl his own form, then Mizuki’s hateful eyes taking his place. “How did you know I wasn’t Iruka?”

Iruka chokes on a laugh. “Because I am.” He rasps as the jutsu ends, his chakra running too low to hold it steady. 

If Mizuki’s shocked, angry face is the last thing he ever sees, then at least Iruka will die knowing he got the last laugh. Knowing that he’s buying Naruto time to escape. That’s all he wants.

Maybe Mizuki isn’t entirely committed to his plan. Maybe he’s overly confident about Naruto’s intentions, or maybe he’s just too obsessed with Iruka, with cutting him down and proving once and for all that he’s the better of them, because he just stands around and talks like a villain from a comic book.

“So noble!” Mizuki has used that word to describe Iruka before. He always says it with a sneer, like it’s a degrading insult, but Iruka’s never quite understood why. Now he does. Mizuki hates that Iruka is better than him. It’s _honestly, really_ funny. Iruka would laugh if he could. Yeah, definitely blood loss. “Saving your parent’s murderer… and for what? What happens if we let him live?”

Iruka really didn’t think there was any “we” about it. Mizuki’s always done that, phrasing them together as a single unit whenever it suits him, as if Iruka has no will of his own. His consciousness is fading, but the longer he keeps Mizuki talking, the better a chance Naruto has at finding the village. “Then maybe the scroll is safe from a complete scumbag.” 

“You’re a fool. Naruto and I are two of a kind.” 

Staring at him blankly, Iruka thinks that he might be hallucinating now, because that’s the dumbest shit he’s ever heard in his life. “Two of a kind?” Was Mizuki always that damn stupid? How had Iruka _missed_ that?

“I can use that scroll to achieve limitless power. The demon within him hungers for that kind of strength.” Looking at him now, Iruka can easily see Mizuki’s demon behind that smirk. It’s as ugly, misshapen and full of rage, as the Kyuubi has ever been. “You were right to fear him, despise him…”

Had Iruka really failed that entirely? Did Naruto think the same? Did he believe Iruka feared him? Somehow, that ripped through him more utterly than the kunai and fuma shuriken whose marks were still embedded into his sinew and flesh. 

“Maybe I do hate the fox…” Iruka’s tongue feels swollen like cotton in his mouth, and it’s hard to make it work right, but he does. He braces a palm against the ground, but he can’t feel any texture through his numb limb as he pushes himself forward, supporting at least a fraction of his own body weight. He doesn’t want to die sitting on his ass. “But not Naruto. Not the boy. For him, I have nothing but respect.”

Iruka doesn’t think he’s ever felt such respect for Mizuki, and maybe it shows, because Mizuki’s eyes shutter and his lips tug down, brows creasing. Iruka continues anyway, because now that he’s started, he isn’t going to stop. The Sandaime’s words echo in Iruka’s mind: _you can save lives without ever wielding a blade_. Well, Iruka’s words can save Naruto’s life tonight. Not the way he had hoped, not the way he had foolishly dreamt of when he pleaded with the Hokage himself what felt like so many years ago. But if he can stall Mizuki, Naruto may live. He may see another day, and that’s all Iruka can fight for now that his body is broken and damned. 

“He’s an excellent student. He works with all his might… Sometimes he’s awkward, clumsy, a screw-up…” Like Iruka was. “People have mocked and shunned him… And it’s given him empathy. He knows what it is to be in pain.” He can hear himself start to slur and he can’t stop himself from slumping forward. The action pulls at the fresh, gushing wound at his back. The agony wakes him back up, makes adrenaline flow through him again, lets him glare at Mizuki and put the emotion he feels back into his words, with all the belief and love and power in his soul. “That boy is no longer the Kyuubi. He is a citizen of Konohagakure… Uzumaki Naruto!”

Something breaks in Mizuki. 

Iruka can’t tell what it is, is shocked that there’s anything left still living in that empty, hateful shell, that’s whole enough to break, but it does. Mizuki clenches his teeth and his eyes burn like charcoal and for one strange moment in which Iruka’s heart doesn’t even beat, it looks as though Mizuki’s going to cry. Perhaps it’s an image from the past, overlaid to reality by Iruka’s feverish mind, because a moment later he’s pulling another fuma shuriken from his back. 

“Aww, that’s so _sweet_. Just hearing you say that makes me all warm and fuzzy.” Mizuki mocks, in the same way he has anytime Iruka has talked about anyone or anything else with love and admiration. Anyone but Mizuki. 

The death blow is coming. Iruka can feel it in his bones. He hasn’t given up, though. He tries to move again, to at least sit up straight for when it comes, but either the blood loss or a severed ligament won’t let him. 

“Well, Iruka…” Mizuki’s voice wavers on his name, but when he looks up, his face is hard and reflective and dead as a rotted corpse. Iruka can’t see anything alive in them. 

“I had planned to save you for last…” A shiver would run down Iruka’s spine if it could. Icy cold drips like water from the crown of his head, disgust and a strong desire to wretch, because there’s dark promise in there. Some intention he’s never seen before. Whatever Mizuki’s plan was, whatever he thought he would do to Iruka, it was probably worse than the death he’s going to receive now. “But sometimes things just don’t work out the way you plan, so… Say goodbye.”

The shuriken whirls, a blur Iruka can’t begin to focus on, but he tries to watch it anyway, forcing his eyes to stay open. 

If death is coming, he wants to stare it straight in the face. 

But it doesn’t come. 

The shuriken pulls wide and, for a crazy moment, Iruka’s almost offended, because surely he at least deserves the modicum of effort to make a decent throw. Then he recognizes the orange blur knocking headlong into Mizuki, speed tossing him back the same way Iruka had minutes earlier. A fear greater than any Iruka has ever known courses through his veins. 

“Keep away from Iruka-sensei, or I’ll kill you!” Naruto’s grim vow might be touching if he weren’t such a damn moron.

“You stupid kid! Should have…” Iruka’s lungs spasm with the effort of speaking, but he’s so pissed and terrified and desperate that he forces hitching words through without air. “Stayed away. Get out of here! Save yourself!”

“Loudmouth brat!” Mizuki screeches, nails on a chalkboard, wild and seething as he claws his way up from the ground. “I can kill you in one blow!”

Naruto moves his fingers into a seal Iruka recognizes, but can’t quite recall. His mind is too fuzzy to think. “Bring it on, you jerk! Anything you throw at me, I’ll give back a thousand times!”

“You’re welcome to try, you--!” 

The last of Mizuki’s sentence gets drowned out by hundreds of ground-shaking pops, like Iruka’s entire class jumping up and down on exploding bubble wrap. Color floods Iruka’s vision and for a second he thinks he’s gone blind, but the orange mayhem starts to coalesce into distinct forms.

A thousand of them.

“What?!” Iruka registers that Mizuki’s on the ground now, from shock or a blow, Iruka can’t tell. He sounds like he’s in shock, but that could be Iruka projecting. “How did he--?”

“What’s the matter, tough guy?” Naruto taunts gleefully. One of them, at least. “Come and get me!” Says another. “You were going to kill me with one punch, right? Come on!” Then, the one that Iruka thinks might be the original says, “Well, then, I’ll just have to attack you.”

They aren’t illusions. That much becomes obvious when audible thumps and groans and pathetic cries begin to erupt from the center of the mob. He can’t see Mizuki, but he can hear every sickening crunch.

Iruka is definitely bordering on fainting from blood loss, because the pride he feels at Naruto’s ninjutsu sinks in more deeply than the relief when he realizes they’re going to get out of this alive. 

Odorless smoke fills the gaps between the trees, and then it’s only one Naruto, Iruka, and Mizuki, two out of three laying beaten on the ground. “Heh… I guess I got carried away…” Naruto says sheepishly, scratching the back of his neck in the exact same manner he had when Iruka first found him. When this was all, in his mind, just a childish prank. 

That innocence is unbearable, painful, and Iruka cherishes this pure child who doesn’t even _consider_ killing out of revenge or spite. 

Iruka doesn’t know if he can say the same for himself. He wants to laugh and he wants to cry, but all he can manage is a slight smile. Naruto stands there, all stupid bravery, dirt and blood on his clothes, a pre-genin who’s beaten a chuunin nearly twice his age, and proud of himself not even because of this accomplishment or his new jutsu, but because he protected someone he cares about. 

“Naruto… Come here. I got a present for you.”

Naruto shuffles forward, unheeding of Mizuki’s unconscious form behind him, and kneels before Iruka. 

“Close your eyes.” Iruka says quietly, less because it’s a surprise, and more because he doesn’t want Naruto to see how difficult every motion is, how his fingers tremble and his knuckles brush against the metal of his hitai-ate because they won’t work properly. It’s a struggle, but he slides it off and on to Naruto. He doesn’t have the dexterity to re-tie it now, so it’s big, sliding down a bit over blond brows. 

It looks perfect. 

“Congratulations, graduate.” 

Naruto’s eyes are precious, round and full of wonder and awe. They make Iruka want to be better, want to show Naruto a beautiful world, so he puts on the bravest face he has and breathes through the pain. “To celebrate this, I’ll take you out. We can go for ramen.” 

The speech can wait until later. Mostly because Iruka passes out within seconds of his promise. 

As he succumbs to blood loss, he feels warmth and cloth surround him.

He dreams of his ANBU, and a scratchy wool blanket covering him once more.


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so, so sorry for the late update! I've been rather sick the last week, and I honestly couldn't get this chapter edited until now. I hope to be back to my normal schedule next week. 
> 
> I realize this story is moving a bit slower than Unspoken, but it will speed up significantly starting about now. I consider the Un/Spoken stories to be character studies with romance as only a secondary facet, and since Iruka has far less of his character explained in the canon, I'm having to write a lot more about him. I hope you all enjoy it and aren't too terribly impatient for the romantic bits, although I promise they are certainly coming, and soon. The very next chapter, in fact, is chock fulla Kakashi.

Fluorescent lighting gives Iruka a headache. It always has. Now it’s staring down at him, invading every cell in his retinas and daring him to comment on the electric, staticy buzz of alternating current, the dead bug and bits of lint accumulated in it’s casing, and the occasional flickering that pounds at Iruka’s skull nearly as much as Naruto’s endless stream of emotive yammering. 

The first eight or so hours after the event found Iruka in a state of only semi-consciousness; blood loss, painkillers, and anesthesia during two surgeries combined to ensure that, by the time he was suitably alert and lucid, the worst of his wounds were partially healed. The next twenty hours were spent struggling to breathe while on his stomach, multiple pillows propped under his chest and neck to ensure his spine wasn’t too heavily taxed while the medic-nins performed routine healing on the four-inch stab wound that, he was told, threaded the needle between his spine and inferior vena cava. His lungs are perfectly intact, the difficulty breathing stemming from a puncture to his diaphragm. They corrected the worst of it during his second surgery, but it will take time and assistance to fully heal. Until then, apparently he’s going to feel as though he’s suffocating every moment he spends laying flat, which is coincidentally and torturously necessary for the medic-nins to assist his sutures in the closing of his wounds. 

Eventually, they let him lie flat on his back rather than his front. It’s not any more comfortable, and it tugs at his stitches, but it’s better than constantly trying to twist, struggling to look behind him at the phantom emerald eyes that make his skin crawl and his spine tingle and his heart pound whenever he attempts to fall into sleep.

It’s two hours after this questionable boon is granted when Naruto comes barging in, Iruka’s hitai-ate proudly displayed on his head. He can tell it’s his from the small, dark brown smear on the fabric framing the metal plate. He’ll have to teach Naruto how to get blood out of clothing. The dirt stains are entirely gone, meaning the kid tried and failed. It’s touching that he put in at least that much effort, considering Iruka had been forced to yell at him before for coming to school in the exact same clothes for six days in a row.

Naruto hovers. It can’t quite be called doting, but it’s something close. He tries to anticipate Iruka’s needs and makes an ass out of himself more than half the time, but Iruka doesn’t call him out on it. It’s almost, Iruka thinks, like having a little brother that looks up to him with grudging admiration. 

But while Naruto tries to take care of Iruka’s body, doing little things like sneaking into the kitchen to get him more Jello or complain to the staff that there aren’t enough ice cubes, he never gives a thought to Iruka’s mental state. He never considers that Iruka might want to be alone. It makes sense. Naruto’s been alone his entire life, so consciously choosing to isolate one’s self must be nigh on inconceivable. Iruka would normally agree.

Naruto doesn’t understand what Mizuki meant to Iruka, doesn’t get that Iruka’s reserve is due to more than physical pain. When Kotetsu and Izumo show up, he scrunches up his nose and can’t seem to comprehend that Iruka has friends, an entire life, outside of the academy. At school, Iruka’s grateful for that because it allows him to distance himself from his teachings when they hit too close to home. The fewer personal questions his students ask, the fewer half-truths Iruka has to provide. Now, Iruka is torn between thanking the Gods themselves for the oblivious nature of children, and wishing that Naruto had the modicum of empathy necessary to realize that the last thing Iruka wants to do is debate the relative merits of miso or pork broth.

It’s been a long time since Iruka has had to hide his grief with smiles for hours on end. Either the medications or the lapse of time have made him soft, because it’s even harder than he remembers. The muscles in his face tremble with the effort, and every second in which he’s under Naruto’s abnormally watchful eye grates against his nerves and skin like sandpaper, tension coiling in his ligaments like cords of a suspension bridge, waiting to snap but unprepared for the fallout that would incur.

Izumo and Kotetsu manage to get Naruto to leave for a few hours. Iruka doesn’t hear what they say to do it. He should ask, because hearing the door slide shut behind Naruto is a relief Iruka would like to repeat the next day, but he can’t seem to get the sounds past his dry tongue. 

The absence of words is louder than Iruka anticipated. The clock high on the wall is silent, but Iruka can see the second hand tick past, dividing time into small measures that Iruka counts and quickly forgets. 

Once Kotetsu realizes Iruka isn’t going to say anything, he starts speaking for all three of them. He says that Mizuki was a horrid bastard, that whatever was happening to him now is far better than he deserves. He says that Mizuki’s face is bony and his hair greasy and many colorful, inventive swears that all basically boil down to ‘what a slimeball’. Iruka doesn’t disagree. He supposes it should be freeing, hearing Kotetsu fight for him, hearing him say all of the things that Iruka can’t utter himself. 

It isn’t. Not at all. Because Iruka _knows_ all of that. He always has.

That’s the problem. 

Eventually, Kotetsu’s lambaste of Mizuki’s character peters out, possibly due to some nonverbal cue from Izumo that Iruka can’t, and doesn’t care to, see. Silence sheaths them once again. The buzzing of the overhead is the only noise that penetrates the thick fog in Iruka’s brain, like the murmuring of bees around a fake flower that appears deceptively real until they land and meet nothing but plastic fumes. 

Izumo and Kotetsu don’t know what to say after that. Iruka doesn’t, either. He doesn’t feel like he has to smile for them, not like he does Naruto, but he can’t cry either. Izumo takes his hand in wordless comfort. Pressure wells up behind Iruka’s eyes and in his sinuses, and he swallows it down as hard as he can. He stares up at the light until that makes his eyes water even worse. Then he squeezes them closed and wishes he knew a way to tell Izumo and Kotetsu to leave, too. Not because he doesn’t want them there (now that Kotetsu’s stopped talking), but because he _does_ , and he _wants_ their comfort, but he doesn’t deserve it. It kills him that he doesn’t even have the strength to push them away. 

Iruka is selfish. He sees that now, more clearly than ever before. He had known what Mizuki was, and he hadn’t cared. He greedily wanted to keep his precious childhood friend, choosing to see that facade even when it was worn and cracked, the brittle layers beneath peeking through in too many spots to count. 

But even that isn’t the real truth. 

Iruka wanted to feel needed. He wanted to feel important. Iruka thought he was better than Mizuki; that he was good, and kind, and that he would have the magical power to salvage the remaining scraps of his friend and make them whole again with nothing expended on his part except for tolerating smiles and an open ear. He had, unconsciously, viewed Mizuki as just another stray dog to feed cookie crumbs to, thinking that would somehow be enough, because surely some affection and charity were all that was needed to turn a feral beast back into a house-trained puppy. 

Iruka had thought of himself as a savior. And not just for Mizuki--for Naruto, too. He spoke to the Sandaime with such self-righteous conviction, believing that he alone would be able to teach Naruto what he needed to learn, that everyone else was holding Iruka back from helping the boy. But Naruto didn’t need him at all. A slip of paper taught Naruto more in an hour than Iruka had in four years. All Naruto ever needed to do was concentrate on what he wanted, and he could achieve it. Iruka was so focused on what he could change about Naruto that he hadn’t even seen that all the kid truly needed was support. Not ramen and a strict hand, not someone to pound the specifics of certain jutsu’s into his reluctant brain, but someone to sit him down and tell him, to his face, that he was loved and he could achieve anything if he worked for it. And Iruka had never done that. Once again, he thought his mere presence would be enough, that a few verbal lashings, casual dinners, and some extra lessons would make up for twelve years of suffering. 

Finally, there’s Iruka’s ANBU. It’s the most insignificant failure of them all, the one that affects the fewest lives, that does the least damage, but it stings nonetheless. It’s another show of Iruka’s poor character. His ANBU had never relied on him, surely, never expected anything important from a lonely, snot-nosed brat. But Iruka had foolishly, selfishly, sanctimoniously believed that he was somehow helping someone else. Or that he _could_ , if his ANBU only gave him the chance. 

Iruka wanted so badly to be needed that he hadn’t seen what any of the people important to him truly required. If he was more patient with Naruto, if he’d paid more attention to Mizuki’s downward spiral, how differently would things have gone? If Iruka was half the person he liked to think he was, maybe he could have prevented all of this. Maybe he could have saved Mizuki’s life. Or maybe it would have done nothing at all, because Iruka never had the power to cause real change in the first place.

And Mizuki’s life is over. Oh, he isn’t dead, yet. The first thing Naruto said when he came in was that ‘the big jerk’ was in jail. Iruka is sure that’s the kind way the Sandaime chose to phrase Torture and Interrogation, because Konoha doesn’t treat traitors lightly and stealing (even by proxy) a scroll sealed away by the Shodaime himself certainly counts as that. But Mizuki might as well be dead. If he isn’t killed by order of the Sandaime, he will spend the rest of his existence half-wishing he was. 

Izumo and Kotetsu never cared for Mizuki. They’re smarter than Iruka, unblinded by lingering sentimentality or a savior complex. It’s almost worse that way. If they needed comfort, Iruka could force himself to grin, force himself to stay strong for their sake. Instead, he stares at the ceiling or his own closed eyelids while Izumo and Kotetsu do their best to comfort _him_ , in what small ways they think they can. 

When they hear Naruto start to barrel down the hall, Kotetsu leans forward until he blocks out the flickering blue glow. “You need anything, you tell us, ‘Ruka.”

“We’ll be back to save you from him tomorrow.” Izumo whispers just before the door scrapes open. Iruka turns his head just enough to see Naruto holding up a giant book, apparently the boon of the errand from which he returned. Kotetsu and Izumo slip out, and Iruka once more has to plaster on a smile as fake and tremulous as the fluorescent lighting.

He wonders if this is why Kakashi wears a mask. He wonders if the jounin has an extra one to spare.

Naruto is forced out by the nurse that night, and Iruka hates how grateful he is for the silence. Because now, he doesn’t have to pretend. At least, not so much. He bites his lip to stifle his sobs, but he lets the tears roll down his cheeks freely. They cool in the air conditioned room and leave sticky salt on his skin. 

If Iruka was as good a person as he wants to be, he would be crying for Mizuki. For the little boy that he was sure, at some point in time, truly had cared for Iruka like a friend, like family. But Iruka isn’t that good a person. He is selfish, and he cries because he’s never before known the taste of self-loathing, but now it won’t leave his tongue, his throat, his lungs. 

Iruka isn’t the person he thought he was. Not at all. 

Anko is the first one through the hospital room door. Iruka thinks it’s probably before official visiting hours, but that kind of thing has always been lax. It’s hard to place arbitrary restrictions upon people who specialize in espionage and infiltration, so the rules mostly apply to children, civilians, and anyone who disrupts the medic-nin’s work. Anko can sometimes fit as the latter, but not today.

Iruka expects her to start in on a rant, to react like Kotetsu did, with passion and fury and illustrious defamation. 

She doesn’t. 

She asks about Iruka’s physical wounds, but then she falls quiet. For several long minutes, she just sits on his bed, her hips pressed into his thigh through the covers, and listens to the ambient noise with him. 

The ache in Iruka’s stomach--the bone-gnawing, deep-seated self-condemnation with which Iruka had been blissfully unfamiliar until a few days ago--sinks in far more deeply, taking firm root in his guts, when he realizes that _she understands_. Everything. She’s possibly the only other person he knows who could. 

She’s been betrayed, too. Not by Mizuki, but by someone she loved, so long ago that Iruka hadn’t even met her yet. But he knows the scars Orochimaru left, emotional ones just as prominent as the fuma shuriken he can still feel lodged in his back. 

Eventually, Anko takes action. She lifts his bed into a semi-sitting position and takes his hair out of it’s matted ponytail, the strands knotted together from rubbing against the sheets for two days. She combs the dark locks with her fingers, gently, carefully, separating each follicle stuck together by sweat and oil and whatever dry shampoo was used while he was unconscious to get out the largest particles of dirt. She gives no indication that she cares about the grime, deft fingers sweeping through with the sort of delicate attention given to sharpening her most favored blades.

His scalp is tender, over-sensitized. He can feel each mild pull of her fingers, but it’s only painful in his mind. The _care_ she uses is painful, the compassionate caresses that are so entirely undeserved and unasked, and Iruka feels hot liquid slip from his eyes, gathering in the scar that crosses his face like a moat before spilling down his cheeks, lips, chin. She doesn’t say a word. She continues to brush his hair with warm, calloused fingers, untangling knots with all the patience he’s never known of her.

It’s painful. His wounds throb, phantom pains even in the stabs that have been healed, and his shoulders slump forward in a way that threatens to rip out his stitches before she prompts him, with a light push on his arm, to lean back against the bed.

Iruka somehow internalizes then, for the first time, that he was _literally_ stabbed in the back by his best friend. He would laugh at the drama of it, if not for the shame that clogs his pores and infiltrates his soul more with every beat of his heart, every loving touch that leaves fingerprints against his skin. 

The sun is high in the sky when she leaves, just as Izumo and Kotetsu did, with a promise to come back soon and a, “I’m always here for you if you need me,” that Iruka knows is meant honestly. He also knows he’ll never ask for anything. His three friends probably know that, too. 

Naruto arrives only minutes after Anko leaves. He stays for nearly the rest of the day, and Iruka does his best to act like normal, except with less yelling. The kid hovers, floating around Iruka like a satellite, revolving in countless, dizzying circles and trying to influence Iruka’s waters with his cheer. Luckily, the hospital staff are strong-willed shinobi with hearts of gold, and they turn away the rest of Iruka’s students when they come knocking. 

They also kick out Naruto before visiting hours are technically over to perform another robust healing session. By the end of it, Iruka is shaky and weak, the room spinning around him, sweat cooling on his chin and chest, and he feels the desperate urge to collapse on the ground even though he hadn’t stood at all. Chakra depletion can cause fevers, and though Iruka’s is suppressed by anti-inflammatories, he can feel it swirling through his body like poison and sapping what little physical strength he might have. He’s glad they haven’t forced him to stand yet, but they will tomorrow. Physical therapy has already been mentioned, although Iruka blocked out the details.

His last visitor of the day is the Sandaime. The old man is, for once, without his pipe, and the scent of antiseptics and the tangy iron of blood are too strong for Iruka to inhale any lingering smell of smoke. He almost wishes he could. It would be something normal, something familiar, as opposed to the new, grim set to the Sandaime’s gaze. 

He sits beside Iruka’s bed and asks after his health. Iruka makes it out to be better than it is. The Sandaime undoubtedly knows better, but he pretends he doesn’t. Then, he gets to the real reason for his visit. 

“I am sorry to ask this of you, Iruka, but I’m afraid it’s necessary.” The Sandaime’s lips tighten into a harsh gash through his skin. “It has been difficult to extract clear motivations from Mizuki, but it seems that his essential plan was to release Naruto’s seal.”

In some insane way, that almost makes sense. Mizuki was perfectly capable of stealing the scroll himself if even Naruto, one of the least stealthy semi-shinobi in all of Konoha, was able to do it. Perhaps he had chosen Naruto purely as a scapegoat, but with his talk of the Kyuubi, leaving Naruto alone with the scroll long enough to understand some of its contents, his effort to tell Naruto exactly what was sealed inside of him, and his words to Iruka about them being two of a kind… it all hinted towards something more than simple plans to kill Naruto, although that might have been what it evolved into after Iruka arrived and sent Mizuki’s plans askew.

“It also seems,” the Sandaime always seemed to Iruka to be a kindly, gentle old man, but his voice now holds a strong undercurrent, steel and tension. Iruka can imagine him giving the orders that end someone’s life. He dizzily wonders if the Sandaime will use that voice when he sentences Mizuki to his eventual fate. “That he was not intending to leave the village alone, after setting the Kyuubi on its path of destruction.”

Iruka’s brain grinds to a halt. For several seconds, he has no thoughts at all. Then he thinks of a girl with short black hair, who ran a fireworks stall and looked at Mizuki like he was the Shodaime’s gift to the earth. “I… his girlfriend, last I knew, was--”

“The supplies we found in the shed where he instructed Naruto to go,” He interrupted, dark eyes intent on Iruka’s. “Were not for a civilian woman.” 

Iruka can see where the Hokage is headed, see the intensity in his stare, and he has a creeping, dawning awareness of the meaning behind it, but he doesn’t want to believe. He feels ice in his veins and he starts to tremble, but he’s well-practiced in self-delusion and he tries to cling to that experience now. “An accomplice?” He croaks, his last-ditch effort at shoving his mind from the terrifying path it had started down. 

The Hokage’s wizened lips press together so firmly they turn white, and he shakes his head slightly, but his eyes never blink. “I do not believe that he anticipated his intended companion to be entirely willing.”

Not a civilian woman. Unwilling. Mizuki, showing up at Iruka’s door, forcing _Iruka_ , _specifically_ , to go after Naruto. His surprise at Iruka finding the place so early, but his unwillingness to kill, the way he pinned Iruka to the shed rather than slitting his throat.

_‘I had planned to save you for last.’_

“I don’t wish to alarm you, Iruka.” The Sandaime must know it’s too late for that, because Iruka’s breaths come in a wheezing staccato. His vision is starting to blur at the edges and his lips tingle. He belatedly realizes it’s because he’s hyperventilating. “If possible, I would not have made you aware of this. But I would be remiss in my duties if I did not explore the possibility that Mizuki’s treason is not solely relegated to this most recent event, and even his mind itself is proving uncooperative for the interrogation team.” He pauses, as if to give Iruka time to steady himself, but there isn’t time enough in the world for that. “Has Mizuki ever mentioned taking you outside of the village? Or perhaps contacts in another country?”

Iruka is suffocating, and shaking, and he doesn’t fully internalize the fact that he’s having this breakdown in front of the Hokage until the man himself presses wrinkled fingers to Iruka’s knuckles, a burst of gentle, warm chakra flooding into his system like a shot of saline, cool and permeating. Iruka forces his eyes open, unaware that they had closed. His vision is blurred, but when he raises his hand he finds that no tears have fallen. He tries to backtrack, to replay the Sandaime’s question and slip himself into the role of a shinobi, someone who can operate even when the ground is crumbling beneath them. Hiruzen is looking at him with sympathy, but not pity. He’s waiting, patiently, for an answer. 

That’s right. There’s more to this than Iruka. More to this than Naruto, or Mizuki himself. There’s the village to think about. 

Slowly, Iruka shakes his head. His lips are cold, unfeeling, but he forces dry air through them. “No.” God, he wanted to run, to hide his face or perhaps just stab himself in the chest and let all of this disgust and fear and loathing boil from his veins and spill onto the speckled white floor. But the Sandaime needs him. At least for the moment.

“Could you hazard a guess as to his plans after leaving Konoha?”

Could he? Yes. A million ideas run through Iruka’s head, each with visceral emotions attached that make him feel nauseous with the churning of it all. But none of them are concrete, none rooted in fact or history. “No, Hokage-sama. I think you know more than I ever did.”

Iruka’s hair falls limp at his shoulders, brushing the scratchy material of the hospital gown. The buzz of fluorescent lighting is finally gone, the room dark and lit only by the moonlight that filters through the glass window panes, falling across his legs and revealing the creamy shade of the cotton blanket. His wounds itch with the ache of healing and breathing is still difficult. 

Even more so when his nostrils are clogged with snot from the tears dripping from swollen eyes. 

Memories flit through Iruka’s mind, some real and some that he questions whether they ever occurred at all. Surely Mizuki never helped him feed stray cats. Surely he never spent hours telling Iruka crazy, unbelievable stories when Iruka was too exhausted from his own crying to fall asleep. Surely he never came to drag Iruka away from the memorial stone to attend the mass funeral, his palm warm and dry in Iruka’s. Surely he hadn’t. And yet, the Mizuki from two nights ago, the Mizuki with hatred in his eyes and blood on his hands, is even more elusive to Iruka’s mind. 

Iruka sees that Mizuki behind his eyelids, but he can’t quite believe it’s real. He sees it in the corner of the room, jade green peering at him from the dark, and has to prove to himself that they aren’t real by use of his mother’s jutsu. He concentrates on the slow build and exhalation of chakra from his palm, closing his eyes to watch the droplets coalesce towards the ground rather than the grim shades of white and gray that actually surround him. He bites his lip to withhold any sound, listening only to the faint hum of electronics throughout the building, the cool breeze outside as it rustles leaves. 

His lips bleeds, and Anko will notice it when she comes in the morning. She’ll understand. Naruto won’t. Izumo and Kotetsu won’t.

Sparks fly from his palm and turn to the sky, falling down in faintly yellow sparks, flowing as if from a fountain spout. He doesn’t have chakra to spare to do the same range as he used to, only sends out enough to reach his room and one other in each direction. He senses the room behind him is empty. The one in front has a sleeping shinobi and a small creature, perhaps a summons from the level of chakra it produces. He feels a nurse walking the corridor, verified by her footsteps pattering just within audible range. He feels eggs from a bird’s nest in the white oak outside his room. The bird is absent. 

He feels lightning. 

Iruka flinches and tries to sit up straight, but his flesh pulls at the stitches that sew it closed and his muscles are too stiff to react properly. His shoulder’s draw tight, but that is as much as his haggard body will do. It doesn’t matter. He couldn’t bring himself to prepare for a fight, but he doesn’t expect one. He _knows_ that chakra. 

Perhaps it’s a dream. A hallucination. Maybe they started the strong painkillers again, the ones he said he didn’t want. Maybe Mizuki had really killed him after all. 

Iruka’s fingers tremble against the bedsheets, but he gathers yang energy once more, heart beating like a war drum and sweat beading on his forehead in the chilly room. 

It takes more effort than it should to reach out with his own chakra, pushing it past the boundaries of his skin without the aid of his mother’s jutsu. He reaches forth, past his bones and his flesh, past the permeable walls of dead wood and plaster and metal and glass. He reaches out until he can sense the tree, and there he finds a solid barrier of life and blood. 

His ANBU. 

Iruka waits, but no answering call comes. No warm chakra brushes against his own, and Iruka’s too tired to think. He doesn’t consider the question of why his ANBU might be there, of why the man is in Konoha and alive instead of a rotting corpse somewhere along with the rest of Iruka’s failures. 

He just knows that he doesn’t feel any reaction from the other presence. He shudders and pulls back, heart and chakra retreating deep within himself, but then static brushes against his skin, tingling like a soothing flame, and it’s the first thing that Iruka is absolutely certain of other than the pain that roars through his spine, the only thing that seems entirely real. 

For a long moment, Iruka does nothing more than bask in that sensation, orienting every molecule, nerve, and synapses to that chakra, that familiar chakra that always felt more real, more tangible, more comforting, than oil or fire or a void. 

_His ANBU._

Then a sob is ripped from Iruka’s chest and his fingers clench into the bedsheet. He thinks he’s falling apart, but the chakra won’t let him. His ANBU won’t let him. Electricity cloaks him in an embrace, as tangible and homely as the wool blanket, and it holds him together even as the rest of his resolve disintegrates. He feels like a child again, like that grieving young boy at the memorial stone. For the first time in years, he allows himself to feel the thundering, quaking, fearful grief that comes with loss. 

He’s lost so much. 

But, somehow, he hasn’t lost his ANBU. 

Time has no concept, just as it never had at the memorial stone. All Iruka knows is that his ANBU never wavers, never leaves. Chakra fills his lungs in replacement of air. Iruka struggles to see into the tree outside his window, the one in which his ANBU must be perched, but he couldn’t see past his tears even if the tree’s eternal green coverage was barren. He squeezes his eyes shut because if he can’t see his ANBU, he doesn’t want to see anything. 

If he shuts off the sight of the hospital walls… the smell of antiseptic and metal… the sound of footsteps and machines... the taste of blood and salt… the feel of soft cotton beneath his fingers instead of wool… then he can focus on nothing but the comfort that envelopes him now. Iruka can pretend that he’s at the memorial stone again, talking to someone who cares, who listens, who watches him and allows him to weep without judgement. 

Eventually, Iruka’s tear ducts become too swollen for liquid to leak through. He wipes his hands with the back of his eyes and they remain dry. His mind spins and he can hardly think or breathe, fever and fatigue and grief crashing down on him like a tidal wave. 

When he drifts off into sleep, his ANBU is still there for him. 

When he awakes, his ANBU is gone.

Hours burn like tinder, slowly and then all at once. Iruka smiles for Naruto, for the medic-nins, and thanks them all with as genuine a tone as he can possibly muster. He feels nothing but a shaky, anxious need, for clarity, for proof, for something solid to grasp onto that will make his memories of his ANBU from the previous night seem like more than feverish hallucination. 

It comes. 

An hour after visiting hours end, the ANBU returns. Iruka half-anticipated his arrival, half-dreaded his absence. But electric tingles brush against Iruka’s skin before he even sets off his mother’s jutsu, and the broken pieces within Iruka settle to the ground, a messy pile that yearns to be melted under the highest heat and made anew. At least, for now, the edges aren’t piercing into his diaphragm, his spine, his spleen, his heart. For the moment, they just lay there, open and raw and bleeding, but not forcing more from him than he can bear.

Iruka falls asleep to the weight of his ANBU’s chakra once more.

The next night, his ANBU shows up even earlier. Naruto is blathering about something Kiba said, something Iruka’s having trouble grasping his mind around, and not just because it’s filled with cotton. He’s spent several years trying to understand the minds of children, but sometimes he thinks it’s a futile effort. Then awareness brushes his mind, and almost without consent Iruka’s jutsu begins to well within his palm. Naruto keeps talking as Iruka’s chakra meets every source of life in the vicinity. Naruto’s chakra splits Iruka’s into smaller drops, replicating each piece by division until they fall away. Out in the white oak, another chakra tingles like static.

It’s difficult to keep himself from forcing Naruto out. Just before the boy leaves, Iruka asks him to open the window. Naruto complies, promising to come back tomorrow to carry Iruka’s bag home. Not that Iruka needs the help--the only things he has are the books and flowers left for him by his friends and his class. But Naruto wants to feel useful, and Iruka is all too familiar with that need, has let it control him more times than he can count, so he doesn’t argue. 

The door closes behind Naruto, blocking off the rest of the hospital, the only air flow coming from the cool atmosphere of spring through the window. Iruka is breathing the same air as his ANBU, and it seems like a ridiculous thought, but its comforting. Iruka is too weak to resist that comfort. He allows it of himself, and he breathes it in, and he lets it stabilize him in a way that none of his other visitors, even Anko, ever could.  
Iruka asked Naruto to open the window because he intended to speak. Now, he doesn’t know what to say. There are questions he wants to ask, but for most of them, even if Iruka could receive an answer, he isn’t sure he would want to hear it. Even if his ANBU truly doesn’t care about him, is only here out of some sense of pity--Iruka wouldn’t have the strength to complain. 

God, he’s _weak_.

It’s a long time before Iruka speaks, but even then, his ANBU waits every moment, never moving. Iruka can’t tell much from the vague outline of the man in the tree. Perhaps he’s a bit taller than he used to be, but not much broader. The only strong, distinct change, is that there’s no sword strapped to his ANBU’s back. Meaning he must not be in ANBU garb. 

Meaning his eyes are visible. 

If only Iruka could see. 

It’s probably better this way. Iruka doesn’t deserve to see anything so precious as his ANBU’s identity. If he hadn’t seen who Mizuki was after the entirety of their lives together, he doesn’t deserve to see this. 

“I trusted him.” The words come out rough like those shards of broken glass swirling in a tumblr, grinding them back down into sand that clogs the gears. He can’t speak loudly, his diaphragm only halfway to healed, but he thinks his ANBU can hear him. He feels a slight disruption in the ANBU’s chakra, a shimmering wave that could mean anything. But it at least means _something_.

Iruka can’t summon the energy to interject emotions into his words. He feels like a hollowed out shell, a dry husk waiting to be lit on fire, but someone else has to be the one to draw the match. Maybe it’ll be his ANBU. Maybe the man will realize that Iruka isn’t even worth his wordless comfort.

“When Naruto said that Mizuki told him about the scroll… I didn’t even question it. It could have been a henge, someone pretending to be Mizuki to get Naruto’s trust. It could have been an enemy nation, or a missing-nin, using something like the Mind Switch jutsu.” There were a million other options that most people would believe first, before accepting that someone they loved turned traitor. “But I didn’t even consider that. I knew, as soon as Naruto said it, that it was true. That it was Mizuki.”

Iruka leans forward until the stitches tug at his inflamed flesh. It braces him, grounds him enough that he no longer sees green eyes and hair like mercury. This is the most difficult part of his confession, the one that he hasn’t told a single other soul, although they can all hear it. “I already knew what he was like. There were signs. I just didn’t want to believe it. I deluded myself for years.” 

Sort of like how he deluded himself into believing he could ever help Naruto, or his ANBU. Iruka’s laugh is harsh, disintegrating the air like acid against rusted metal. “I trust _you_ , someone who’s face I’ve never even seen, more than my--” 

Iruka inhales sharply before he can say the next word, throat convulsing and choking around it. 

Mizuki was never his friend. Mizuki was never Iruka’s anything. Mizuki was never _his_ to begin with.

Somehow, that hurts most of all.

Iruka doesn’t sleep until nearing dawn, and he doesn’t speak again. But his ANBU never leaves.


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A return of happiness?? Is it?? Yes! Troll Kakashi coming soon, and I promise to severely cut back on the depressing shit now that Mizuki is rotting away where he belongs. In other news, I wrote 5k words of a new work yesterday and outlined plots for two others, and I swear they're filled with less angst and hurt/comfort than Un/Spoken. xD

A total of roughly five days in the hospital is all it takes to replenish a good store of Iruka’s chakra and heal the worst of his injuries. The physical ones, that is. He’s even able to walk home by himself, although it’s slow going and Naruto bounces around him in excitable circles, visibly holding himself back from bounding forward. They stop at a bench halfway between the hospital and Iruka’s apartment, and Naruto shows more tact than Iruka thought him capable of when he doesn’t question it. Eventually they make it. Naruto exclaims over seeing Iruka’s home for the first time, wrinkles his nose at the crammed bookcase of technical works, criticizes the insufficient quantities of instant ramen, and proceeds to prepare one for each of them. Iruka even has the energy to force him to add frozen vegetables and berate Naruto for trying to sneakily (how did this kid ever steal a forbidden scroll?) shove his in the nearest potted plant. The attempt is made even more foolish by the fact that it’s _plastic_. 

Physical therapy mostly includes creams and stretches to keep the torn tissue of his muscles and skin from healing in too rigid a form, and Iruka’s able to do it at home with only one visit back to the hospital for his stitches to be pulled. Just as his restlessness builds to the level of contemplating cleaning his apartment, Iruka is allowed back to work. Only three days after his release finds him standing in front of his class and handing out group assignments to the excitable, fresh-faced pre-teens. 

The teams of three are up to the academy teacher’s discretion, as the person most familiar with each student’s ability, but the Hokage himself assigns their mentors. Iruka won’t meet their jounin instructor unless they pass, when he’ll have the traditional meeting with the leaders to discuss their pupil’s strengths and weaknesses. Iruka has sat in on that sort of meeting once before, but this will be his first time conducting one of his own. 

When he hears that Kakashi is Team Seven’s jounin-sensei, his first reaction is confusion. He’s taken mission reports from Kakashi regularly for some time, and never once has the report been below a B-rank, even though there were a rare few in which Kakashi led a team of other jounin or chuunin. And, as far as Iruka is aware, Kakashi was in ANBU before that. He assumes that this is Kakashi’s first team, that he was assigned purely because his sharingan would allow him a unique ability to teach the last remaining Uchiha, until the Sandaime shows him the list of rejected students from years past.

Iruka’s hope for Naruto’s future sinks ever lower. Iruka had thought of Kakashi’s Cold-Blooded reputation as overstated, at odds with the lackadaisical mannerisms the man portrayed. Obviously Kakashi is _dangerous_ beyond belief, one of the strongest shinobi in the Leaf apart from the Hokage. But Iruka himself has never seen more than eye-smiles, ridiculous excuses, and smutty novels. 

Now, he thinks he understands. It’s true that few children pass their very first genin test, but with the number of rejections Kakashi has racked up, the Sandaime must have been attempting to assign him a group from every single graduate for the last two years or so, at a minimum. And Kakashi failed each and every one. Iruka even recognizes a few of the names, classes that he assisted with in the past, most of them were talented children from prominent clans that Iruka has difficulty believing weren’t up to snuff for mere D-ranks. 

Iruka has nothing to do but await anxiously for news of Naruto’s results. He does his assigned stretches in his bedroom, seeing a few stray spiders under the bed as he struggles to reach his toes. He puts off killing them even though he knows he’ll remember their existence in the middle of the night when he tries for sleep, long legs and tiny bodies creeping into his subconscious. But if he kills them, he’ll have no excuse not to clean out the dust bunnies under the bed frame, and that’s more effort than Iruka feels like expending. 

It takes three cups of tea and the sun setting before Naruto comes knocking on Iruka’s door, sour-faced and dirty. Iruka’s heart plummets, and he opens his mouth to say something—consolations, regrets, a “work hard for next time”—but Naruto comes inside without invitation and speaks first. 

“Man, I can’t believe I gotta work with that guy. He’s just as bad as Sasuke! They didn’t even untie me!” Naruto complains, slipping off his shoes before jumping on Iruka’s couch hard enough to slide it back several inches, no doubt leaving scratches in the flooring. 

“Sit properly.” Iruka scolds automatically, but his ears prick up, hope sparking in his chest as he registers Naruto’s words. “Work with…? So Kakashi-san passed you all?” He can’t keep the surprise from his tone, and Naruto evidently notices, because he turns a disgruntled look on Iruka and raises a finger to point at him accusingly. 

“You didn’t tell me I could fail! You coulda warned a guy, ya know! And that jerk even told us not to eat, too—”

“Don’t talk about your sensei that way.” Iruka actually means his scolding this time, because he’s suddenly full of a rather considerable amount of goodwill towards Kakashi, grievances of past students utterly forgotten. “How did you three pass?”

Naruto launches into the explanation headfirst, painting himself as the victorious hero who saved the damsel-in-distress Sakura and begrudgingly pulled Sasuke along for the win as well, forcing the Uchiha to admit that Naruto was the better man. Iruka is certain that isn’t how it went, but a few raised eyebrows are all he allows to show his dubiousness. He doesn’t want to rain on Naruto’s parade. Naruto’s had precious few things in his life to celebrate, and Iruka wants this to be one of them. 

His meeting with the new jounin-sensei goes well. At least, it does for two-thirds of the instructors. Kurenai and Asuma are strong, relatively stable jounin that seem to have a good grasp on their student’s powers already. Kurenai is only recently promoted, still humble enough to ask Iruka questions about her charges. Asuma tries to light a cigarette and Iruka (politely, of course) asks him to put it away. It earns him a look of disbelief, then grudging acquiescence and silence for the duration of the meeting. Iruka ignores the crossed arms and bored expression, accustomed to far worse from his students. By the time Kurenai and Asuma leave, Iruka thinks Kakashi won’t show at all, and he doesn’t have the patience to wait. If Kakashi’s anywhere near as late as his mission reports usually are, Iruka could spend the night in his classroom with nothing more than a cold to show for it. 

Turning to erase the board, Iruka stands on his toes to wipe the higher names rather than raising his arm enough to tug at his wound. The sutures came out a few days before, but the skin is still tender and fragile in the way of too many chakra-forced healings. 

He feels the presence of another person a moment before a light voice greets him. “Yo, Iruka-sensei.” Iruka looks around, annoyance narrowing his eyes. He crosses his arms over his chest, full disapproving-teacher mode activated as Kakashi continues. “Ah, it looks like I’m a bit late.”

He’s actually pleasantly surprised that Kakashi showed at all, but Iruka isn’t going to let him know that. His back hurts enough that he doesn’t have to feign the impatience that colors his tone. “What’s your excuse this time?”

“Iruka-sensei, you wound me.” The dramatics of the words are belied by the casual way Kakashi leans against the door jam, idly scratching the back of his neck. His eye floats somewhere just beyond Iruka’s shoulder, the very picture of lazy indifference. He doesn’t have his masked nose buried in _Icha Icha_ , but he still can’t seem to give Iruka all of his attention. “I don’t use excuses. You see, I was on my way here—perfectly on time, I might add—when I saw this kitten fall into a storm drain.” He drawls solemnly, no hint of humor in his monotone. “Then an unexpected and surprisingly isolated rain fell exactly on that one spot and started washing the kitten away, so I had to jump in the gutter and follow it halfway across Konoha, and—”

“And, inexplicably, you managed to stay completely dry in the process.”

“Well, I am a shinobi, after all.” Kakashi’s eye creases into a smile. Iruka wonders if it’s reflected beneath his mask, and decides, with some resigned melancholy, he’ll never get to know.

Iruka sighs and turns back to the chalkboard, erasing all but the names of Team Seven. He didn’t actually need the names written, of course, and he should hope the jounin don’t either—but it makes him feel better to have chalk in his hands, something to do and look at rather than Kurenai’s strange crimson stare or Asuma’s bored indifference. Or, now, lean musculature and an indolent slouch. “I feel sorry for your students, Kakashi-sensei.”

“Just Kakashi.”

At the moment, all Iruka wants to do is get this over with so he can head home and drink some caffeinated tea to ease him through the next three hours he’ll spend studying the profiles of his next class’ members. He sets the eraser on the ridge of the board and turns back to Kakashi. “So, your genin… You’ve already met them, so you have some idea of their personalities and abilities. Any particular questions?”

He expects Kakashi to have none, the same as Asuma. Most likely Kakashi only showed to ensure that Iruka wouldn’t seek him out later (and Iruka normally _would_ have, but the way he’s feeling these days, he doesn’t think he would have bothered). Since the incident that led Iruka to healing Kakashi in this very classroom, they’d had no interactions beyond the mission desk, and Kakashi is rarely more than polite and cordial—other than the state of his mission reports, which contradict any such thing. 

“Actually, sensei, since it’s already so late—”

Yeah. There goes the excuses. “And who’s fault is that?” Iruka mutters churlishly. At best, Kakashi will say that he’ll follow up with Iruka on a later date if he has any questions, and then never do so. 

“I was wondering if you would like to get dinner with me.”

...Huh.

Absorbing that statement, Iruka meets Kakashi’s half-lidded gaze with wide eyes. He searches for any sign that this is a joke (and he’s not sure what the point of it would be if it was), but he can read nothing from Kakashi’s bland stare. After a second of silence, Kakashi explains himself beguilingly, giving the appearance of smiling once more. “I’ve been training all day, and I’m starving. We can talk about the kids while we eat. I’m craving ramen. What do you say, Iruka-sensei?” 

Iruka watches him suspiciously, but Kakashi’s expression never wavers, innocence curling around his slumped posture in a deceptive cloak. But Iruka can’t see any harm in it, and he believes in Kakashi’s dedication to putting as little effort as possible into anything that doesn’t include protecting the village. He must have a reason for the invitation. Iruka nods and erases the last of the names from the board, then wordlessly follows Kakashi out of the school. 

Once their feet hit grass, Kakashi slows to fall into step with Iruka. His hands are shoved into his pockets, eye half-lidded, gait loping and lazy, looking for all the world like he’s strolling along at exactly the snail’s pace he would even if he weren’t accompanying an injured man. Iruka’s been taking walks around his apartment building in the early mornings, slowly building his stamina back to what it used to be, but it’s slow going, and he knows his speed is roughly half of the purposeful stride he would normally take. But Kakashi doesn’t seem to care, so Iruka doesn’t force himself, focusing on keeping his steps short enough not to stretch his scar tissue. 

He thinks he knows what Kakashi wants to discuss, and although he isn’t sure a public forum is the best place to do it, he won’t question Kakashi’s decision. For now.

The backless stools provide little in the way of lumbar support, but it’s a relief to sit. Iruka keeps his spine stiff as he slides onto one, ordering his usual and then turning to Kakashi. The jounin is already watching him, gray eye unreadable. “What do you want to know?” Iruka asks.

The question comes immediately, as if Kakashi had been waiting for a sign from Iruka to start. “How was Sasuke as a student? He’s pretty advanced for his age.”

Apparently they were starting slow before circling to the real subject. “Yes, he is. He has more chakra than most kids his age, and he’s the best in the class with weapons handling. He’s withdrawn, and a loner, but he generally doesn’t cause problems.” Iruka sometimes caught a sullen muttering from Sasuke’s corner, but he only ever disobeyed when Naruto goaded him into competition. Iruka’s a bit fond of the kid, despite his more stubborn traits… and Iruka’s fears for his future, if he keeps living on nothing more than hatred. “He and Naruto will be difficult together, but they have the potential to push each other beyond their limits. I was hoping that Sakura would help calm them down when things got too bad.”

“Not so far.” Kakashi sounds vaguely disapproving. His one visible eyebrow draws down in what could be a frown as he watches Teuchi cook. “She seems more interested in Sasuke than in training, at this point.”

Iruka can’t argue with that. “She definitely has a crush on him. But most of the girls do, so that would have been a problem no matter how I grouped them.” Still, Iruka has confidence in her abilities. “She’s a smart girl, though, and her grades on paper were always higher than even Sasuke’s. The only place she lagged was practicals, mostly weapons training, and her chakra level isn’t as high as some of the others. She has good control, though, and picks things up easily. If she can find an area she’s really interested in, I think she has the potential to become an excellent kunoichi.”

When their food arrives, Iruka realizes, somewhat belatedly, that Kakashi will have to lower the mask to eat. Iruka has no idea why Kakashi wears it, but as far as he’s heard of the gossip, Kakashi has worn it for long enough that no one remembers a time when he didn’t. Iruka looks away politely while they eat, keeping his eyes set on the teapot that Teuchi has brewing behind the counter. He didn’t realize he was hungry until the aromatic broth made his mouth water. He hasn’t had much of an appetite since leaving the hospital, and instant ramen has been his constant companion. This, at least, has vegetables and meat included with the overload of carbs.

Iruka can sense Kakashi beside him, a strong presence that he can’t ignore, but it’s several minutes before Kakashi speaks again. “I hear you’re close to Naruto.”

“Where’d you hear that?” Iruka automatically turns to look at him, only remembering as he does it that he meant to keep his eyes averted. But Kakashi’s mask is securely back in place and his bowl is empty.

Kakashi tilts his head slightly and taps his hitai-ate. 

“Right. Shinobi.” Iruka looks down at his mostly full bowl, an unsettled feeling in his stomach as Kakashi keeps watching him. Although his mannerisms and tone rarely betray interest in anything, Kakashi’s eye seems to tell a different story. His gaze is intent, heavy on Iruka’s skin.

“Mm.” Kakashi turns his gaze to Teuchi, wiping down the other end of the bar. The old man is more than accustomed to giving shinobi their space in conversations, and he seems to have determined this is one that requires it. “I think I’ve got a good assessment on his abilities, but I hear he’s a troublemaker. Rather like you used to be, sensei. Any tips for handling him?” 

Heat rises to his face and he instinctively tries to deny the accusation. “I wasn’t—” He has no idea how Kakashi is even aware of Iruka’s old, less-than-obedient ways, but he supposes some of his antics were dramatic enough to have his name shouted across all of Konoha. He falters and rubs his nose in embarrassment, looking down at the duck egg swirling in his bowl. 

Iruka sighs, biting his lip while he chews on his words. He wants to defend Naruto, but he can’t entirely deny the truth. “He’s a good kid, really, he just needs some motivation. He gets easily frustrated when he doesn’t understand something, and he’s not good at sitting still.” An understatement, but Kakashi probably knows that much already. “But if you give him something to work on, something to keep him occupied, he’ll put in his all. He just needs some positive reinforcement.” The sort that he hadn’t received from Iruka for far too long. Perhaps Kakashi can do better than Iruka on that front, although he doubts it’s in the ex-ANBU’s nature to rely on encouragement rather than criticism. “You may have to explain something a few different ways before he gets it, though. He can be a bit…”

“Dense?” Kakashi cheerfully suggests. 

Iruka shoots him a disapproving glare. He’s called Naruto an idiot plenty of times, but it sounds harsher coming from someone else, someone who doesn’t care for the boy the way Iruka does. “He’s just better at learning practically than from theory, that’s all.”

“Hmm.” Kakashi has a strange way of switching between jaunty and serious in a single moment, no transition between. His eye-smiles can drop in a blink, leaving question as to whether they were ever there at all. Now, he effortlessly turns one into a sharp, analytical assessment, reminding Iruka of a captain examining the potential flaws in an entry strategy. “And you’ve never noticed his seal weakening?” 

“No.” Iruka’s answers, startling at the sudden shift in direction. This is essentially what he expected Kakashi’s questions to come around to—something regarding the Kyuubi, in any case—but Kakashi’s mercurial manner throws him for a temporary loop. Kakashi watches him for a moment, appraising, but he seems to accept the response and moves on with dizzying speed. His eye and voice remain intensely focused upon the chuunin.

“I heard about the incident with the Scroll of Seals.” He says, a blunt, matter-of-fact statement. The broth sours on Iruka’s tongue. As Naruto’s new instructor, it makes sense for Kakashi to want to know the details of the event and the forbidden jutsu itself. That doesn’t mean Iruka has to like it. At least, this time, Iruka won’t have to discuss his own role in the events, as Kakashi is presumably uninterested. Iruka frowns and looks down at his bowl, stirring his ramen idly with his chopsticks. Kakashi continues without heed to Iruka’s reticence. “Was he close to Mizuki?” 

Iruka forces his tone to remain even as he responds. “Not especially.” 

Green eyes flash behind Iruka’s vision. Noodles fall from his chopsticks, splashing small flecks of broth on Iruka’s sleeves. Clearing his throat, he sets his chopsticks down across his bowl, uncomfortably aware that Kakashi must have noticed his hands shaking. “They were going to give him his first class this year, with Kiyoko taking maternity leave. Until then, he was just an assistant to all the teachers. He only met Naruto a few times before we—” 

_‘What happens if we let him live?’_

Iruka’s wound stretches taut as his shoulders curl forward, air stiff and immalleable in his lungs. The words came unbidden to his mind, and he shoves them away with a considerable force. 

His eyes are closed (when did that happen?), but he can feel Kakashi’s presence beside him. It gives him something concrete to focus on rather than the images of the past. He takes a deep breath, centering himself, and manages to calm his surface, soothing the ripples to hide the whirlpools beneath. Kakashi can no doubt see them anyway, but he’s patient enough to wait for Iruka’s continuation. “Before the final exam.”

Kakashi sounds undisturbed. “Naruto trusted him enough to steal a forbidden scroll on his word.”

Anger flashes as quickly as a katon, Iruka’s hackles rising in Naruto’s defense. “Naruto trusted his teacher.” His voice cuts sharp as a whip. 

Kakashi meets Iruka’s glare for a moment, then glances away and down to his teacup. Slender fingers curl around the rim, swirling the liquid within. 

When Kakashi speaks again, his voice is quiet, soft in a way Iruka has never heard from him before. A more tender layer to add to the dimensions that comprise the Copy-nin. But the words themselves punch Iruka in the gut, unexpected and poignant. “It wasn’t your fault either, sensei.”

Pain sparks in Iruka’s thigh as he claws his fingers into a barely healed wound. He stares at Kakashi, unsure what he’s expecting to see.

Kakashi isn’t looking at him, and with the movement of his lips hidden behind his mask, Iruka could almost think he imagined the entire thing. But the heat welling in his cheeks, the talons wrapped and squeezing around his throat as he internalizes those blunt words, are too strong to not be real. 

Kakashi sits there, shoulders slouched, eye on his tea. His presence is as quiet and unassuming as it’s ever been, as if Kakashi knows the reaction he’ll get is unfavorable.

Well, it is. Iruka doesn’t want pity.

“With all due respect,” He spits the words like wasps, respect and propriety flying out the window in an unmissed gust. “It’s none of your business, Kakashi-sensei. You don’t know anything.” 

Kakashi’s gaze rises slowly, meeting Iruka’s fire with calm pools of silver. Mercury, rather than mercurial. “I know.” 

He doesn’t look pitying. He sounds like he believes it, like he’s been through this same thing every night for a dozen years, and Iruka doesn’t know how to react to that, doesn’t want to open his armor long enough to think about it. 

He doesn’t have to react. Kakashi continues, unblinking. “Hindsight is perfect. There’s always something you should have done, something you should have said, something you should have seen. If you let them, those regrets will consume you. But in the end, it was his own choice. He could have chosen differently. He could have asked for your help.” 

Iruka doesn’t need to be told the obvious. He’s heard these words before, from the Sandaime, from Kotetsu and Izumo, from his own mind, from the unvoiced comfort of Anko’s fingers in his hair. He doesn’t want to hear it again from Kakashi. If it were that easy to forgive himself, he would have long since done it.

Looking away, Kakashi brings the teacup to his lips and drains the liquid through his mask. It stains the fabric a darker hue, moist and shining in the dulling light. Iruka finds it easier to look at than the exposed portion of Kakashi’s face as the man continues. “Mizuki thought that Naruto would take the blame. He thought everyone would be content to think that Naruto stole the scroll for his own selfish reasons. He thought he could kill Naruto, and no one would care.” 

Setting his cup on the counter, there’s a moment of silence in which Iruka’s heart thuds in staccato and he waits upon a precipice, with uncertain anticipation, as Kakashi turns to him. “Iruka-sensei…” His eye crinkles and his mask shifts, rising with his cheeks. 

It’s a real smile, an honest one. It steals Iruka’s breath. “His downfall was not believing in you.”

The wave comes crashing down.

Iruka crumples. He ducks his head and angles his face away, pressing the back of his arm to his eyes hard enough to cause red spots in his vision. Heat wells behind his eyes, but the cloth of his uniform soaks in the tears before they have time to drip down to his scar. He clenches his thigh tightly, but his nails don’t dig in—this time they’re grasping with palms and fingers, holding on, grounding himself, because he feels like he’ll fall away if he doesn’t. 

Iruka’s livid. He’s embarrassed. He’s ashamed that he’s crying, in the middle of Ichiraku, in front of _Hatake Kakashi_. He’s terrified of the relief he feels at those words, unable to put into defined thoughts how momentous it feels to be absolved of guilt from someone who he would have never asked. 

He’s exhausted, and he’s in pain, and he’s sick of blaming himself. Maybe Iruka is weak and searching for an escape that Kakashi so easily provides, or maybe it’s never been in Iruka’s personality to hate anything, even himself. Maybe it’s the absolute certainty with which Kakashi says those words, the hope that it gives, because they don’t sound like empty comfort, but a truth borne from empathy, something that rings as clearly and purely as a church bell. They sound like words Kakashi has been told before, or ones he had once wanted, _needed_ , to hear. Maybe Iruka’s just too tired to recognize any insincerity there. Maybe he just doesn’t want to.

Despite the tears he rubs from his eyes, the pain in his spine and abdomen and thighs, Iruka feels like he can breathe for the first time in a week. And maybe a week is nothing compared to whatever Kakashi has been through, compared to what others go through every single day of their lives—but it feels like a lifetime to Iruka. 

It also feels like a lifetime before either of them move. He can feel Kakashi’s body heat beside him, never quite touching, but hovering near enough to sense. He can hear the scrub of Teuchi’s rag against a ceramic cup, but nothing is said. It isn’t until a group of people push open the curtain, chatting noisily and taking seats on the remaining stools, that the fragile stillness is broken. Iruka ignores the searing aches as he abruptly pushes back from the table, sliding from the stool and stiffly standing. 

He reaches back for his wallet on automatic, but Kakashi’s gloved hand is faster, slipping a pile of bills on the counter. “It’s my treat, sensei.” He says. His tone is back to that light, carefree tone that Iruka’s become accustomed to. Almost. He speaks a decibel too softly, his voice pillowed in smooth cotton as if cushioning a blow or expecting one in return. To Iruka’s desperate ears, it sounds like deference rather than pity. “I asked you, after all.” 

Iruka realizes, perhaps too late, that this was Kakashi’s intention all along. Not the food, or their students, or even the Kyuubi: _Iruka_. 

Turning away, Iruka takes a shaky step towards the street. He’s a mess of emotions, a tangled web that will need time to absorb the complex cacophony that Kakashi’s attempt at comfort brings.

_Comfort_.

Pausing, Iruka doesn’t look back as he offers what little he can in return. His voice is quiet, because any louder and his voice would break. But he thinks Kakashi hears him. 

“Thank you, Kakashi-san.”

When he gets home that night, to an empty apartment, a cold bed, and too-soft blankets, Iruka stares at the ceiling and sees a gray eye instead of green. 

He doesn’t know exactly what to think, can’t absolve himself of pain and guilt in a single night. That’s too much, even for Iruka, even when he repeats Kakashi’s words over and over like a mantra, like a prayer, embedding them into his mind as securely as he can. 

He can’t fully believe them at the moment. Not now. Maybe not tomorrow. But he has people that will verify the truth of those words as often as he needs to hear them—Anko, Izumo, Kotetsu, Naruto in his clumsy and unspoken manner. He has people that believe in him, even when he doesn’t believe in himself.

Iruka’s not happy. Not at the moment.

But it’s a good start.


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Development. :o 
> 
> Kakashi accidentally flirting and then being mortified about it is absolutely my kink.
> 
> Also, conceptualizing this scene with Kurenai is actually what sparked the idea for Un/Spoken, so I hope you all enjoy it. Constructive criticism is much appreciated and loved. <3 Also, I desperately need a beta to fix my glaring mistakes and keep me down to a reasonable chapter size.

Five impeccably defined, dark brown smudges stare up at Iruka, daring him to comment on their presence. Iruka blinks, but the prints are still there when he opens his eyes again. He looks up to Kakashi, then back down at the scroll, because there’s nothing he can get out of Kakashi’s cheery eye-smile other than a reddening of his own cheeks. 

Pushing the scroll back across the desk, Iruka chooses to attribute that flush to the anger that rightfully _should_ be rising up any moment now. And it _is_ there, buried down beneath the layers of embarrassment and the obnoxious fluttering in his stomach that’s somehow become an automatic response to Kakashi’s appearance over the last couple months. 

“Next you’re going to say they ate your homework.” Iruka comments dryly, thankful he has better control of his voice than his face. 

“Unfortunately, their taste runs more towards steaks and beef stew.” Kakashi rubs the back of his neck with a chuckle. “Naruto’s tried, though.”

“You’ve given Team Seven homework?” Iruka inquires with a raised brow. He’s sure that’s not standard practice for a jounin-sensei, but he’s not one to complain about extra education.

“Ah, well, I tried to trick—I mean, _teach_ them how to fill out reports. Sakura and Sasuke saw underneath the underneath, but Naruto said he would do it for two bowls of ramen. When he figured out I intended to give it to _you_ , he tried to get rid of it through any means necessary. He seemed to think that incurring your wrath wasn’t worth the price.”

“Whereas you seem to think it’s worth any price.”

Kakashi’s eye curves higher, as if he’s particularly pleased with the accuracy of Iruka’s assessment. “Maa, within reason.” 

Iruka looks down at the scroll Kakashi still hasn’t retrieved. “I don’t consider an official mission report covered in muddy pawprints to be reasonable.” He tries to make his tone stern, but he doesn’t think he exactly matches the irritated timbre that might have resonated in the room before. 

Before Ichiraku’s.

It’s not that Iruka has suddenly forgiven himself due to Kakashi’s words, or that he’s ‘gotten over’ Mizuki’s betrayal. He still believes he was deluding himself for his own selfish, if subconscious, reasons. He still believes that there’s more he could have done, even if that was just to keep a closer eye on Mizuki to catch the beginnings of his scheme long before it was put into play. He still regrets that he was so harsh on Naruto, that he provided so little support that the boy believed his only chance at graduating was to steal a forbidden scroll. (And honestly, he also blames himself for not knocking some more sense than that into Naruto’s head the last few years, because that was sheer idiocy no matter what Mizuki told him. If he’s that gullible, what kind of future will he have as a shinobi?) 

But the guilt is… easier to deal with now. It doesn’t consume all of Iruka. It slides into his thoughts most days, lurking in the corner like a persistent shadow. Occasionally it takes the forefront, catching his miseries like so many flies and trapping them in the stickiest of silk. Those days are rare, and becoming increasingly rarer. He’s steadily moving past self-flagellation, sparks of his fury spitting towards Mizuki rather than himself. Because although he can’t fully resolve himself of blame, Kakashi is right. Mizuki made his choice. Mizuki became a twisted, sadistic person who enjoyed the emotional pain he inflicted on a twelve-year-old boy. His actions were of his own doing. Possibly Mizuki wasn’t entirely sane, but he understood the consequences of releasing the Kyuubi, of murdering a child. Iruka should have done more, true—but he hadn’t forced Mizuki’s hand. That’s what he would tell Anko or Mizuki’s girlfriend, if he thought he was in a place to offer help to either of them.

Plus, he’s busier than ever, leaving little time for depression to take hold. Naruto’s missions rarely take him outside of the village, meaning Iruka sees him more days than not, either at the mission desk or showing up at his house on random nights under the pretext of complaining about Kakashi or Sasuke, or leeching off Iruka’s newly replenished stockpile and loudly complaining when Iruka forces him to eat something else for a change. The new school year has also started, and Konohamaru is turning out to be nearly as big a troublemaker as Naruto, with the added difficulty of two followers who hang on to his every hare-brained word like monkeys on bars. 

Since that discussion at Ichiraku’s, Kakashi has acted exactly the same as usual. He drops off his reports solely to Iruka, often accompanied by an enthusiastic (and ridiculously dirt-covered) Naruto. The reports Kakashi hands in then are usually bordering on decent enough that Iruka accepts them with little comment. He doesn’t want to make Naruto’s respect for Kakashi lessen. 

It’s also possible that Iruka accepts a bit more than he should from Kakashi these days. 

Once again, it feels as though there’s… something there. Something that could be there. Too many times, it’s on the tip of Iruka’s tongue to go father, at a minimum work their way into friendly conversations more often. But even beyond the insecurity that the vast differences between them bring, Iruka has many excuses he tells himself for why he can’t. First of all, Iruka would rather get stabbed with another fuma shuriken (not wielded by his oldest friend) than have Naruto hear him ask out his sensei. He would rather get stabbed with a _poisoned_ fuma shuriken than let Naruto hear the subsequent rejection, and even on days like this, when Kakashi doesn’t have Naruto in tow, there’s Iruka’s colleagues at the mission desk to overhear.

Kakashi’s reaction to the imagined proposition is impossible to predict, but Iruka has brutal images of being laughed at or simply waved off dismissively, and both ideas crush any courage he could have potentially mustered. The man takes enigmatic to an extreme. Kakashi doesn’t dislike him, he thinks, but whether any interest extends beyond lighting the flames of indignation in Iruka’s cheeks remains to be seen. Kakashi went out of his way to help the chuunin, true, but all that requires is a decent sense of empathy. And he does believe it to be _empathy_ rather than sympathy.

‘Friend-Killer Kakashi’.

_“There’s always something you should have done, something you should have said, something you should have seen. If you let them, those regrets will consume you.”_

None of that was drawn from thin air. 

There’s no reason for Kakashi to take a chance on Iruka. Frankly, Iruka isn’t even sure if he himself can do that. Not while the scar on his back is still tender and aching. 

“You’ve never lived with a whole pack of ninken, then.”

“If I can get thirty eight-year-olds to turn in papers on the founding clans of Sunagakure, I think you can handle the challenge of a single scroll that doesn’t scoff in the face of protocol.” 

“There are other difficult things I would rather spend time handling.” Kakashi says smoothly. 

Iruka’s skin might as well have caught on fire as he tries to reconcile the low, velvet intonation with a mere comment about fieldwork. In his periphery, Sayuri stares at them with wide eyes before turning to help the next shinobi, and Iruka wants to take that as confirmation that _If Kakashi isn’t flirting, he should be locked away for life for casually subjecting innocent chuunin to heart attacks._

He doesn’t realize Kakashi has frozen, chest not even rising with breaths, until the man snaps into motion. He leans forward and, so quickly Iruka can’t track the movement, steals the mission report, holding it up as if he has to look closely to spot the small-to-ginormous paw prints marring the sheet. “You would accept it without the pawprints, hmm?”

“Er…” The setting sun paints a red glow on the highest part of Kakashi’s cheekbones, almost giving the impression of a blush. It’s incredibly distracting. There are numerous other issues with the report—sloppy kana, only a single line in section 2-A, at least three instances of rhyming that have to be intentional—but all of those grievances get stuck somewhere in the fluttering pit that seems to have also swallowed Iruka’s indignation. “Yes. That’s, uh...”

Kakashi’s gray eye slides to meet brown and he abruptly hands the scroll back. Their fingers brush as Iruka automatically takes it, looking down at it for an unseeing moment before his brain catches up. “What—you haven’t—” He starts, frowning down at the offending object. 

“I’ll take you at your word, sensei.” Kakashi says, and when Iruka looks back up, he’s already halfway out the door. Iruka’s instincts are to yell after the bastard for not fixing his damn report, but those last words are strange enough to make him peer at the contents first.

The paw prints have mysteriously disappeared, either a transformation jutsu to begin with or sleight of hand replacing the scroll with a near-duplicate. The other errors are absolutely present, and they stare up at Iruka like they’re laughing at him. 

Iruka has the distinct feeling he’s just been played like a fiddle.

He does not wonder how Kakashi might play with him in other contexts. 

That bastard. 

Iruka’s injuries mostly heal and he starts training with more regularity than he has since he was preparing for his own chuunin exam. It’s slow going, just getting his body back to it’s pre-Mizuki state taking some hard work and effort, but it’s a soothing routine. He most often uses the training ground closest to the memorial stone, both because it means no one’s around to watch him struggle just to land a decent spinning kick, and because that makes it simple to pass by his ANBU’s tree and visit his parents when he’s done for the day. 

He doesn’t wait for his ANBU anymore. The visits at the hospital were enough to prove that his ANBU is alive and more than capable of finding Iruka if he ever chooses to. Beyond that, Iruka can’t do anything, and by now he’s realized that he doesn’t want the same one-sided relationship that they had before. When he was a kid, all he wanted was to be noticed, cared for, listened to. Now, he places importance on reciprocity, on actual words spoken and shared. 

Like that dinner with Kakashi, a small part of Iruka’s mind insists, and he studiously shoves it back in its box. 

Iruka’s pretty much come to peace with the idea that he won’t see his ANBU again, and though it’s a bitter thought, he’ll live. Iruka has learned that he can live through a lot of things. 

There are also precious people in Iruka’s life, more than he had back when his ANBU was his major source of self-validation. Naruto is star among those important bonds. The weeks Kakashi’s team spends out of the village on a standard C-rank are oddly quiet, anxiety filling the empty rooms with each day that passes after their anticipated return.

When they finally pass through the village gates, damaged but whole, Iruka lets his concern slide into relief. Sasuke is the only one of them who has to spend time in the hospital, and when Iruka visits him, he’s feeling well enough to be his usual, morose and emo self, so Iruka figures it’ll be fine. Sakura seems to have a touch less bounce in her voice, but perhaps that’s for the best. After begging for a more difficult mission, then barely coming out of it alive—while Iruka wouldn’t _wish_ that sort of pain on any of the students in his care—might be good for them. Now, they’ll realize what being a shinobi truly means, and build their experience and prowess gradually without rushing headlong into danger out of a childish desire to prove themselves. 

Like Mizuki always had. 

The chuunin exams are called and Iruka is on the rotation of academy teachers to assist. He can’t say he’s eager for the extra workload, or the danger it will impose on the older genin who choose to participate—Iruka remembers all too clearly that deaths related to the exam are not unheard of—but he’s curious to see the future of Konoha. 

At least, he is until that future of Konoha turns out to be nine young children who spend more time finding missing cats than training. 

“Hold on a second!” 

The Sandaime regards Iruka calmly as the latter takes a few steps forward, jolts of anger and disbelief propelling him to disregard proper decorum. “What is it, Iruka?”

All eyes are on him, Kakashi’s included, but Iruka couldn’t care less. “Hokage-sama, please let me say something. I may be speaking out of place, but these nine were my students at the Academy. Of course, they’re all very talented, but it’s too early for them to take the exam. They need more experience. I can’t understand the jounin’s reasoning.” 

Iruka has been speaking to the Sandaime, but he whips around when Kakashi’s mild voice interrupts. “I became a chuunin when I was six years younger than Naruto.” 

When he was six? 

A cold shiver runs down Iruka’s spine, accompanied by the mental image of a masked, silver-haired boy with chubby cheeks and blood on his hands, but the chill can’t compare to the boiling heat in Iruka’s gut when he imagines _Naruto_ with blood on his hands, gushing over pale lips. “Naruto is different from you! Are you trying to crush these kids?! The chuunin exam is—”

Although Kakashi’s hands are still in his pockets, eye half-lidded, there’s a rigidity to his posture that isn’t usually there, a readiness that forges his smooth-as-liquid form into a weapon as precise and deadly as a tanto edge. 

“They’re always complaining about the missions.” Kakashi says, and although Iruka had the same thought only days earlier, it takes an entirely different tone when spoken with blatant apathy. “Experiencing some pain may be good for them. Crushing them could be fun.”

The blood that rushes to Iruka’s face has nothing to do with attraction or embarrassment. Every interaction he’s ever had with Kakashi of the Sharingan takes a backseat to that terrifying declaration. “What?!” 

Kakashi’s gaze slides away. “Maa… that was a joke, Iruka-sensei. I can understand your feelings.” It sounds ironic, the way Kakashi phrases it, and Iruka’s teeth grind together in the effort not to speak. In that moment, Kakashi is as distant as a mountain peak, making Iruka truly feel, for the first time, that Kakashi is in a place he can never reach. 

That he doesn’t want to reach.

“It must upset you, but…”

Kurenai says something, too quiet for Iruka to discern through the pounding of his heart in his ears, the rage and hurt tainting his blood. Kakashi gives no indication he hears her, focused on Iruka with deadly intent.

When the blow comes, it’s sharp and decisive, a kunai parting Iruka’s vocal cords. His fingers clench together, blunt nails digging into the meat of his palms as he struggles not to back away on sheer instinct. Kakashi is an emotionless slate, as unchangeable as time and exactly as lethal. 

“Stay out of this. They’re no longer your students. Right now, they’re my soldiers.” 

There is no choice but to step back into line, no choice but to remain silent as adrenaline starts to leach out of his bloodstream and the meeting continues as if nothing occurred. Iruka can’t help his gaze from slipping to Kakashi’s form, but the jounin acts for all the world as if Iruka doesn’t exist. 

Shame slowly starts to seep into chaos of Iruka’s emotions, embarrassment for not waiting to speak to the Sandaime or the jounin in private rather than making a commotion in the middle of the meeting. But he doesn’t think anything he said was incorrect, and the looks Anko shoots him throughout the briefing are concerned rather than rebuking.

The instant the session is adjourned, a swirl of smoke and leaves take Kakashi’s place, and Iruka is left staring at a vacant patch of flooring that gives him as much of an emotional response as the man himself probably would have. 

Iruka starts to turn, heading towards the door—to go where, he hasn’t decided yet—but a hand rests lightly on his shoulder. Iruka flinches, fingers twitching towards his kunai, but dark bangs and pupil-less eyes slide into view. He forces himself to relax as Anko asks him to meet her for drinks later to discuss... something about the chuunin exam. Iruka does his best to listen, but the pinch between Anko’s brows lets him know he doesn’t do an excellent job. 

Just as she leaves, Iruka’s stopped once again, and he’s about ready to snap at whoever won’t just let him leave, but this time, the face that greets him is pale and lovely, framed in long black tresses and set with blood-red irises.

“Iruka-sensei,” Kurenai murmurs politely, and though she doesn’t precisely smile, there’s an open feel to her expression that makes Iruka think he might not be in for another harsh verbal slap in the face. “If you have the time, would you care to have tea with me? They have some new exotic varieties at the dango shop around the corner.”

What is it with jounin and randomly asking Iruka out when he wants nothing more than privacy to lick his wounds? 

Intending to refuse, Iruka opens his mouth to refuse, but something stops him. The memory of Kurenai in his classroom, his discussion with her regarding her teams. She listened to him patiently, asking pertinent questions that betrayed an interest in the student’s personalities and home lives rather than merely their abilities. 

If there’s any chance of talking some sense into the lot of them, Kurenai is it. Kakashi and Asuma may be above listening to the words of a mere chuunin, but as Kurenai watches Iruka, he thinks that, perhaps, there’s a very small chance he can appeal to her better senses.

Nodding, Iruka follows her out the door. Much the same as with Kakashi, they’re silent until they sit and order their drinks. The shop is empty, the hour sometimes between the lunch and dinner rushes. It isn’t long before a steaming hot cup is placed before him. Kurenai lifts hers to her lips, showing no pain at the scalding temperature of the liquid as she sips at it delicately.

_Jounin._

“I’m sorry for Kakashi’s abruptness during the meeting, Iruka-sensei.” Her tone isn’t apologetic, but neither does it come across as insincere. “He’s always been a serious person. It’s easy for him to forget how to temper that intensity when he’s passionate about something.” One corner of her brightly painted lips lifts slightly in the barest hint of a smile that Iruka can’t reciprocate. 

“I can’t say I got the impression of _passion_.” 

Somehow, her lipstick leaves no stains on the ceramic cup. Iruka wonders if she uses a ninjutsu to seal it or if women’s makeup just has that sort of witchcraft inherent in its design. “Then perhaps it’s a good thing you weren’t in school with us. He used to be much worse. He’s mellowed a lot over the years.” She adds with a thoughtful hum, feigning obliviousness to Iruka’s uncontrollably dubious expression. 

That was a _mellow_ Kakashi? The impression he got was of an unfeeling predator who would slit his throat without a single thought if he thought it worthwhile. 

Then again, prior to today, Iruka would have used “mellow” without question to describe the face that Kakashi put on for most of society, even if he had always seen a hint of something sharper underneath. 

“I can’t say his sense of humor has gotten much _better_ , but at least he has one now.” Kurenai continues, taking a savoring sip of her scalding tea. He looks down at his own cup and swirls the liquid, wondering if it’s some sort of weird jounin test to see if he blisters trying to follow her example. “He really was joking, however poorly it came across. Kakashi wouldn’t have volunteered Team Seven if he didn’t think they were ready.”

That would have meant more if Kurenai hadn’t offered her own genin for slaughter, Iruka thinks cynically, but manages to keep that opinion to himself. “I understand it wasn’t my place to question any of you before the Sandaime.” He apologizes, mostly genuine. “I’m sorry for putting you on the spot, Kurenai-sensei.”

“I’m glad the genin have someone who cares for them as much as you do. That much has been obvious since our initial meeting.” She says simply, crossing one slender knee over the other. “Which is why I’m not surprised at your tactful wording. I presume you do believe it’s your place to question us in private?” 

Red irises meet brown, and though there’s no hint of ire or challenge in her tone, Iruka can’t help but flush as irritation and embarrassment flood him. He definitely could have handled this better, even if he doesn’t regret the sentiment behind the outburst. “I just want what’s best for the children. I’m not questioning your skill, or teaching methods, or those of the other jounin-sensei—” Iruka struggles to find words to convey what he wants without coming across so rudely that she dismisses him out of hand. “But I believe we have very different perspectives. You three are very gifted individuals.” 

That’s putting it mildly, and Iruka is quite aware, in his standard chuunin uniform, that he doesn’t even begin to stack up when it comes to strength or experience. Not with fighting, in any case. But he has experience in something else that matters, in this case, far more. “I’m sure you advanced quickly. But that doesn’t mean such advancement is suitable for every child, even if some of them might be powerful enough to survive. And times have changed. We’re no longer in the middle of a war. What’s best for these kids can’t be to throw them into lava head first, to—to _destroy_ them.” 

He’s unconsciously leaned forward, voice rising a few decibels with the conviction of his words, but Kurenai just regards him levelly. Iruka meets her eyes as best he can until, many long seconds later, she lowers hers to their tea. Iruka finally brings his own up, blowing on the surface of the cup before taking a small sip. It’s rich and well-brewed, the woody flavor coating his tongue and filling his lungs. It’s a relief to focus on while he waits for a response, to see if he’s made even a crack in that exterior. 

“You’ve never been on a mission with Kakashi, have you, Iruka-sensei?” 

It seems like a strange diversion, but Iruka shakes his head in response.

“I have. Not many; Kakashi rose to jounin before I made chuunin.” She says, no hint of embarrassment or resentment about her classmate’s catapulted position. “But I’ve been on his team a few times in recent years. The last time, we almost lost one of our own. There is no doubt in my mind that we would have, if not for Kakashi’s idiocy.” 

Iruka is completely lost. “Uh—” he starts when Kurenai doesn’t continue. “Idiocy?”

“He took a stupid risk. Nearly killed himself saving her, and endangered our mission in the process.” She doesn’t offer details, and Iruka knows much better than to ask. “But he never hesitated. He jumped forward when the rest of us were contemplating how to achieve our primary objective, trying to take all of the risks himself while ordering us to keep going, to make it back alive. The only reason he succeeded is because he’s the sort of genius that comes around once in a century, and he has no concept of his own limitations.” She sighs, a painted nail tapping idly against her ceramic.

“...I’m not questioning Kakashi-sensei’s loyalty to the village, or his comrades.” Iruka says slowly, uncomfortable with the implication. Any Konoha shinobi would die for another. That isn’t unique to Kakashi, as touching as Iruka is sure it must have seemed at the moment. 

Kurenai’s eyes narrow. “I haven’t made my point yet.” 

“Ah.” Iruka shifts in his seat. “My apologies, please continue.”

“What’s important is what he said just before he threw caution—and himself—off a cliff to protect us.” There’s a weighty pause, and her next words are said slowly, her lips curving around the syllables as if still turning them over in her head. “‘I’ll never let my comrades die.’” 

She lets that sink in, and Iruka presses his lips shut to keep at bay the questions that threaten to spill forth. He feels as though the phrase should be momentous somehow, but it isn’t. It’s idealistic, almost naive, in a way that Iruka knows Kakashi can’t be. 

“He’ll never let his comrades die.” She sets her empty cup on the table, ceramic clinking on scratched wood. “Death is part of our world. You know that as well as I do, and so does Kakashi. He mourns more at the memorial stone than any of us. But those aren’t empty words. It’s a promise Kakashi has made to himself many years ago, a dedication that he lives by. More than a mission, more than pride, _far_ more than his own life… Kakashi will always protect his comrades, for as long as he’s left breathing. That is the ideal at the very core of his being, and what has shaped the entirety of the man he has become.” 

Iruka’s reflection stares back at him from amber liquid, neat ponytail and slashing scar and the darkness to his eyes that reflect the tightness in his throat. 

He gets it now. 

“There are reasons for it. Some I know, some I don’t. None are my place to say.” Kurenai folds her hands in her lap. Her tone is gentle, but her countenance is sober. “Iruka-sensei, I could give you a list of reasons as to why I believe Hinata, Kiba, and Shino are ready for the chuunin exam. Asuma and Kakashi could no doubt do the same. But all you need to know is that not a single one of us would put their lives in jeopardy for the sake of bragging rights, or some cruel test. Kakashi least of all. I’m asking you to believe in us, and in the brilliant young men and women that you have so carefully raised. They are more ready than you think.”

With that, she rises and heads to the front counter. By the time Iruka drags himself from his chair, she’s long gone. The shop owner tells him that she paid for his tea, and Iruka owes yet another jounin for dinner. 

Iruka finds his way home. He eats leftover chicken and fried rice, does his stretches, and rubs salve into the knotted scar tissue he can reach. His thoughts run in circles; concern, anxiety, rage, and fear all take their turns in the spotlight. After sunset, he finds himself walking to the memorial stone, hardly paying attention to where he’s going until he’s already there. 

He’s not alone. 

For a moment, he sees an overlay of his ANBU, a gray blur that rings a pang of nostalgia so deeply in him that he staggers, pausing mid-step. As his eyes focus in the dim light, he recognizes the differences. A jounin uniform rather than ANBU, no sword, standing rather than sitting, silver hair that’s a few inches too long, a touch softer and healthier. The man sways in the wind rather than sitting as still as death, and his shoulders are too broad, silhouette a few inches too tall. 

Kakashi. 

Not his ANBU.

_"He mourns more at the memorial stone than any of us."_

Iruka wants to turn, but he’s never run from the memorial stone before, and this moment will have to come eventually. His feet carry him forward until he’s standing on Kakashi’s right side, conscious of the lack of visibility on the left even if he’s never seen Kakashi guard it. 

There is no reaction to his arrival.

“Kakashi-sensei.” Iruka greets quietly, turning his face to the stone. He rather feels as though he’s intruding on something private. He probably is, but the damage is done. His lips keep moving without his permission. “I’ve heard you come here, but I don’t think I’ve seen you before.” 

Waiting for any indication as to Kakashi’s state of mind is a lengthy process. Iruka starts to regret not turning straight around and leaving. He hasn’t decided that Kakashi and Kurenai are correct, still can’t imagine those snot-nosed brats who whined about homework leading troops into battle—but he can, now, at least offer a token of peace. “I shouldn’t have questioned you before the Hokage. I was out of line.”

Kakashi doesn’t stir, and when Iruka chances a glance at him, his features are impassive, eye trained on the stone. Iruka exhales and rocks back on his heels, deciding that’s the best he’s going to get, but before he can leave, Kakashi’s tense voice interrupts the night.

“This is where they passed my test. To become genin. I told Naruto that the names of heroes were written here. Do you know what he said?”

At this point, Iruka’s getting used to not following jounin in conversations. He’s just relieved Kakashi is speaking. He shakes his head in answer, and Kakashi’s eye finally flicks over to meet his.

“He said he wanted his name written on it.” 

Iruka’s air is knocked from his lungs.

He has never taken Naruto to the memorial stone. He never saw the point, since Naruto has no one for which to mourn. Just like the lady with the lipstick smile, Naruto’s family is lost among a sea of others, and taking the boy there would have only gouged in that absence. But to hear Naruto; young, innocent, reckless Naruto; say that he wants his name carved there… it’s a physical blow, a violent and sorrowful image. 

The only shock absorption provided is the way that Kakashi steadily holds Iruka’s gaze. He can see a stormy sky in the dark gray. Sleet, and hail, and wreckage, and sixty mile an hour winds, and he wonders how he ever thought Kakashi emotionless.

When Kakashi continues, his eye flits over Iruka’s features, taking in his reaction. “I don’t want his name written here. Or Sasuke’s, or Sakura’s. But they almost were, in the Land of Waves. Because of me. Because I didn’t prepare them.” 

The self-recrimination is unexpected, although it shouldn’t be. Anyone who spends time at the memorial stone, anyone who knows what to say to comfort someone betrayed by a loved one, is no stranger to regret and remorse. “It wasn’t your fault.” Iruka rushes to say, and whether or not he agrees with Kakashi’s assessment of the children’s abilities now, he absolutely believes this to be true. “It was supposed to be a C-rank mission, you couldn’t have known—”

“It doesn’t matter. They should have been able to handle it.”

Brow furrowing, Iruka opens his mouth to speak. He knows Kakashi was a child prodigy, but expecting Team Seven to fend off an S-rank missing-nin goes beyond high expectations. Kakashi anticipates Iruka’s objection and speaks first, with a nearly imperceptible shake of his head. “Not one of the Seven Swordsmen of the Mist, but the others. Instead, Naruto froze.” 

Iruka wishes he could say that’s a surprise, but he remembers how Naruto reacted to Mizuki, how he didn’t rise from the ground even after his teacher’s body was riddled with shuriken and Iruka was screaming at him to run. If he hadn’t freed himself, rushed forward just in time, that fuma shuriken would have ripped through Naruto’s small, fragile body like paper. 

He shudders to think of Kakashi doing the same, dying protecting the children, blood leaking through his mask and pale skin interrupted by the metallic sheen of a blade. Kakashi, accepting death with relief, like Iruka’s mother, as he himself had almost done.

It _hurts_.

“Sakura couldn’t do anything but stand there, and Sasuke nearly died to the hands of a boy his own age. If they had trained harder, if I had prepared them more, things could have gone better.” A hint of frustration leaks into Kakashi’s tone, but it’s clearly self-directed. Perhaps the weaponry Iruka had seen during their argument, the threat and derision, hadn’t been meant for Iruka, but Kakashi himself. “They might be children, Iruka-sensei, but they’re put in dangerous battles, the same as any of us. If war comes again, they’ll be expected to fight and die to defend their country. What’s more, they’ll want to. You won’t be able to stop them.”

_I can stop them_ , Iruka wants to say. _I can die in their place_. 

But he can’t, and he knows it. His students are trained to become warriors, and they understand the risks involved with that. Just as he can’t force his way into the Hyuuga household and shake her father until his brain rattles around in his skull, just as he can’t force the villagers to look at Naruto and see the brave, caring boy that he is instead of the vessel of the demon fox, he also can’t follow his students on each of their missions. He can’t protect them, not really. All he can do is give them all the skills and knowledge possible to survive. Iruka does that through books and organized skirmishes, patience and no small amount of yelling.

Kakashi is trying to do that, too. In his own, harsher way. 

Inhaling deeply, Kakashi rakes his fingers through his hair, silver locks a gash like lightning against the darkened sky. His skin is as pale as starlight, the black of his glove a forlorn shadow. “You do them no favors by trying to keep them young forever. They’ll fight, and they’ll be in situations where missions go wrong, or they’re ambushed, or they’re found by an S-class missing nin. It shouldn’t happen, but it does.” There’s still an edge of frustration to his tone, but there’s also weariness, an osmotic knowledge that there’s nothing in the world that can change the truth of this, along with the resignation that comes from decades of trying anyway. “Other countries are training their children as soldiers, and so we must as well. If we try to hold them back, they’ll rush forward head long, and they won’t be prepared for what they find. Their names will be written here long before you think they’re ready to be chuunin.”

Rush headlong. Like Nartuo had, stealing a forbidden scroll on a virtual stranger’s word because he was so desperate to advance, so desperate to prove his own worth, to validate his existence, that he easily did the unthinkable. If Mizuki did a better job of it, if he used a transformation jutsu and created a copy of the scroll when Nartuo wasn’t looking—it was possible that they wouldn’t be having this conversation at all, because Naruto would be long dead in the ground, or rotting away in a high-security prison in Mizuki’s place. That might have been the last straw, regardless of the Sandaime’s fondness for troublemakers. 

Perhaps holding the children back isn’t the perfect solution. In fact, Iruka knows it isn’t. But the only options aren’t flying or falling. There’s a medium, a bridge they can walk across the chasm, and Iruka wonders if Kakashi has truly considered that or if he’s latching on to the first challenge that comes their way. “Do you think they’re ready to become chuunin?”

“No. They won’t pass this time. I’m certain of that. But they won’t die, either. They’ve grown, since you taught them. They’re strong enough to survive the exam, and what they encounter there… will help them survive for a long time after.” 

Kakashi intends to hone them into the weapons that shinobi inherently are, to build their callouses with friction and struggle believing that, ultimately, they’ll be stronger for it. 

Iruka approaches it differently. He believes in strength built over years of constant work, depressions formed through gradual erosion rather than the impact of a crater. 

But he thinks he understands. When Kakashi said he intended to break them, perhaps he was attempting a poor joke, but the metaphor was accurate—just not in the way that Iruka first interpreted it. Kakashi doesn’t intend to break them down from boulders into pebbles, glass into sand; he wants to break them like muscle tissue tears when it’s strained, rebuilding and growing and amassing strength and power through the application of stress. 

He’s just shit at explaining himself. 

It’s almost endearing, except for the way that Iruka isn’t entirely certain if Kakashi understands the fragility of the bodies he’s playing with here. 

Then again, who would understand more?

A refreshing breeze tugs at loose strands of Iruka’s hair, and he pushes them to security behind his ear. Kakashi is watching him, waiting, and Iruka gives him a wry smile. He isn’t going to apologize for caring for his students, and he isn’t convinced of Kakashi’s perspective, but he can accept now that his own reaction was borne from emotion that clouded his better judgement and obscuring what he already knew about Hatake Kakashi. The man who offered a virtual stranger comfort without obligation or motive. He treats Naruto as a shinobi of Konoha, rather than a ticking timebomb.

“I’m sorry, Kakashi-sensei. I should have trusted your opinion a little more.”

Kakashi’s response is immediate and bitter as instant coffee, though Iruka can’t tell why. “You don’t know me enough to trust me.” 

“The Sandaime trusts you. And Naruto.” And, because Iruka isn’t ready to admit how much Kakashi’s words that day helped him, and how much he’s thought of the jounin ever since, he forces the conversation to something light, adding a dash of cream to the caffeine. “I’ve spent more than a few nights listening to him talk about you. Although most of it is regarding your habitual tardiness and questionable choice of reading material. He calls you a lazy pervert.” 

Almost anyone would take some measure of offense to that, but Kakashi accepts it without question. “Out of the mouths of babes.” He comments dryly, prompting a laugh from Iruka. Kakashi’s eye creases in the barest hint of a smile. 

Turning his face to the sky, Iruka relishes the breeze on his skin. It washes away the last traces of betrayal that had assaulted him at Kakashi’s decision. It gives him the confidence to issue a warning without fear of being killed on the spot. “I can’t say that I necessarily agree, but… You better be right, Kakashi-sensei.” 

“I know I am.” The answer is simple, and though Iruka would have taken it as dangerous arrogance only a few hours earlier, he can hear the calm assurance in it now. 

Nodding, Iruka looks to the memorial stone. There are more questions he could ask, more things he wants to know, in regards to their student’s and Kakashi himself. He wants to know who Kakashi thinks of when he looks at the memorial, and how he learned about the consuming nature of regrets. He wants to hear about Team Seven from their leader’s perspective, to see if Kakashi really thinks that there’s a possible future in which Naruto can achieve his dream. He wants to know what it’s like living with eight ninken and asking them to step on a mission report just to annoy a random chuunin, because there is little doubt in his mind that wasn’t intentional. 

Everything Kakashi does seems to be intentional. Deliberate. From provoking Iruka’s ire to asking him to dinner, Kakashi had put forth far more effort into his interactions with Iruka than he did in an average month with Team Seven, if Naruto was to be believed (he probably wasn’t). From Kurenai’s words, Iruka can surmise that Kakashi is intent and focused beneath the trappings of lackadaisy. The fact that he doesn’t leave now, standing quietly by Iruka’s side, is another sign that he doesn’t abhor Iruka’s presence. Seeks him out, even. 

It occurs to Iruka then that Kakashi wasn’t obligated to explain his reasoning. He could have brushed Iruka off here the same way he did in the briefing. But he didn’t. Kakashi carefully watched Iruka’s reactions and took his questions at face value. Iruka almost would have expected a ‘sometimes you get lost on the road of life’ or other bullshit misdirection, if not a flat out dismissal, but he listened to Iruka’s complaints and did his best to assuage his worries. 

That means something.

Iruka feels lighter now than he has in weeks. It feels as if the tension has broken, as if the stalemate they’ve been locked in for a year has finally been destroyed by both pieces moving forward at once. It’s a pleasant feeling. It makes him think that, if he and Kakashi disagree in the future, they can handle it with mutual respect. That Kakashi would rather incite Iruka’s hatred and disappointment than lie to his face or pretend to be something he’s not. It makes him think that any strike Kakashi delivered would come head-on, and not stabbed in his back. 

Iruka is strong enough to handle that. 

Though nerves are licking at his cheeks, sweat tickling his palms as he realizes what he’s ab out to do, he doesn’t feel any uncertainty. He thinks now that, if Kakashi is going to reject him, he won’t do so mockingly, but with the respect that he’s shown Iruka tonight. So he takes the chance that he should have long ago. 

“Would you like to have dinner with me again, Kakashi-sensei?” 

Wind rustles in the leaves and Iruka’s heart thuds against his chest. The silence grows to nearly deafening before Kakashi breaks it.

“Now?”

Hope simmers as Iruka’s heart tries to interpret that as acceptance, but it’s outweighed by the embarrassment that washes over him when he realizes how little he thought this through. He’d only been thinking of Kakashi’s potential response, not the logistics of an actual date between them. Once again, he’d rushed forward without deciding on a tactical entry. “Ah, well, perhaps not tonight. I’m helping Anko with her part of the exams, plus my normal schedule at the Academy…” Iruka rubs his scar nervously, hoping his palm obscures the worst of his flushed cheeks, though he should probably be more concerned about the fraying in his voice. “Maybe after the second round of the exams end?” 

“Alright.” Kakashi agrees, with a naturally casual air than Iruka envies. Even as joy and relief blossoms petals in his heart, it sparks a small seed of doubt, the uncertainty if Kakashi realizes that it’s intended to be a date rather than a meal between colleagues. But Kakashi continues, and the addition makes a pleasant, tingling warmth overtake the fluttering in Iruka’s stomach. “I look forward to it, Iruka-sensei.” 

If it’s not a date, Iruka figures he’ll find out when the time comes. For now, he’s secured a promise for something outside of the mission room, outside of an all-too public argument. He’ll be able to ask the questions he wants (or at least some of them), without pretense beyond a desire for the other’s company. While Iruka is attracted to Kakashi, both physically and romantically, he’s pretty damn happy just at the prospect of time together. Regardless of Kakashi’s intentions, they’re moving forward, and that knowledge makes Iruka beam with more elation than he’s felt since long before he lost Mizuki.

“Great. I’ll find you then.” Iruka says breathlessly, taking a step back before he rises to Naruto levels of excitement and embarasses himself further. _Strategic retreat, time to regroup_. “Have a good night, Kakashi-sensei.”

He feels Kakashi’s eye on him as he turns towards the village, but the stare no longer makes him uncomfortable. It’s a pleasant tingle, like static in the air after a thunderstorm. Anticipation. 

Iruka has something to look forward to.


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I read all of your comments with tangible zeal. Huge thanks to everyone who's commented, kudos, bookmarked, or just made it this far. <3

Iruka’s role in the chuunin exam isn’t a large one, and most of his work is done before the exam even takes place. Anko asks him to assist her in designing and implementing the seals in the Heaven and Earth scrolls and keying them to each chuunin’s chakra. When the exam begins, Iruka can do nothing but watch and wait.

Miracuously, every single one of Iruka’s students, Naruto included, manage to not only survive the second exam—they _pass_. 

Iruka is proud. So, so _proud_ of the strong shinobi that his snot-nosed brats have become. He’s proud of the Will of Fire, and proud that he’s managed to pass it on to another generation, one that will become even better than the last. 

He’s also terrified, and contrite, and, though he’ll never tell them, the victory is bittersweet. His children have grown up. He can’t predict or control where they’ll go from here. Some of them will die in the line of duty, and it will be their right to do so. He hopes it’s after they’re old and fulfilled, satisfied with the life they have had to live. There’s still so much for each of them to learn; about love, about honor, about responsibility and pain and finding something that’s more important than themselves. He’s glad he was proven wrong. He’s also regretful that they can’t remain children just a little bit longer. 

Oh, most of them won’t make chuunin this time. Likely none. Shino, TenTen, and Shikimaru are the only Konoha genin Iruka can see even coming close as far as the maturity and cool-head required to lead a team. But this experience has changed them all. They have grown as people, as shinobi, as young men and women. The dirt on their faces, Sakura’s ruined hair, the determination in their eyes… they aren’t children any longer.

Kakashi was right.

Iruka’s responsibilities teaching at the academy haven’t been postponed due to the exam, and so Iruka can’t watch the preliminaries, but he waits anxiously to hear the results. Part of him hopes for Naruto to fail, because that would mean he wouldn’t have to take part in the final tournament, but a larger part of him realizes how selfish that is. Naruto’s excitement and pride at making it so far in the exam haven’t left Iruka’s mind, and while he knows Naruto won’t pass as a chuunin this time around, making it to the third test would validate his self-worth and provide him with valuable experience. 

Naruto does pass the preliminaries, and Iruka realizes that he should be used to Naruto surprising him by this point. Not all of the children faired so well. By the time he visits Hinata and Rock Lee, and learns about Sasuke being taken by Kakashi— _somewhere_ —for training until the third test, Iruka is far more worried than he can let Naruto see. There are foreboding storm clouds on the horizon. Iruka feels them in his blood, but there are none in sight. 

On Monday morning, Iruka finds something on the teacher’s podium in his classroom that, if not puts him at ease, does serve to uncoil some of the worst fears writhing in the back of his mind. It’s a note, unsigned except for a child-like doodle of a face in the corner. Iruka would have taken a minute to make the connection of _henohenomoheji-scarecrow-Kakashi_ if not for the familiar, sloppy handwriting. 

_‘Raincheck on dinner?_

_I’ll keep him safe.’_

If Iruka uses the note as a bookmark in the coming weeks, at least he’s the only one to see.

The next month passes in a blur. A very slow blur, the kind that happens when liquid drips onto dried water paints—absorbing, loosening, expanding, blending the pigments until the original image is muddied and distorted. The tension Iruka felt lingers, seeps into his skin, and it isn’t just due to the foreign shinobi occupying the village, although that is part of it. Shinobi are a paranoid lot. Ally of Konoha or not, not a single one would lower their guard with so many unknown faces lurking in the shadows. 

Technically, Iruka’s life doesn’t change much. He teaches, he scolds, he accepts mission reports from shinobi with pristine scrolls and impeccable posture, he become a frequent visitor at the hospital, he remembers a gray eye and wild silver hair, and he spends more time than ever on the training grounds.   
Almost three weeks have passed when Anko finds him there. She’s been uncharacteristically absent since the second exam, even her usual haunts of the dango shop and the Sharpened Kunai empty of her presence. Whenever Iruka’s caught sight of her, her steps have been harried, her face set in grim lines and no playful jabs to be found. 

She isn’t keen to talk. She shrugs off his greeting and plops cross-legged in the grass, summoning a half-dozen yellow-bellied snakes who slither on the ground around her and drape over her lap and shoulders. It would be alarming if Iruka wasn’t accustomed to all manner of serpents by now. One of them approaches and turns in a circle before him, cold scales sliding against his toes.

“Thank you,” Iruka tells it, accepting the silent offer and flipping his hands into seals. Chakra wells and lines of curving black script shoot around them, contrasting against the bright grass in slowly revolving, concentric circles. They seal the serpent’s movement, confining it to the three-foot space. It explores the limitations of its new boundaries for a few moments, bumping against the barriers. Iruka senses chakra growing within the snake’s coiled body, and then the jutsu breaks. 

“Damn,” Iruka sighs, rubbing his sweaty palms on his thighs. “Let’s try again.”

Anko watches for nearly a half-hour, heckling him a few times when her snakes manage to destroy his seals. He’s getting better, though, learning how to distribute his chakra more evenly across the barrier, and eventually he manages to keep the snake contained for a full ten minutes. 

He could ask her about Kakashi. He could ask if Kakashi has ever shown an inclination towards men. He could ask if she’s ever seen him with a chuunin, because it hasn’t escaped his notice that all of Kakashi’s limited social group are tokubetsu or higher. Iruka could ask if she’s ever actually seen the man’s face, if he keeps aspects of himself hidden even from his sexual partners, or if she thinks his desire for privacy would mean any committed relationship he indulged in would have to be discrete, kept quiet from the rest of the village. Iruka can’t see himself lying to friends over the long-term.

But even beyond the way Iruka’s ears burn at the thought, he’s not certain if Anko would answer. She’s normally a loud-mouthed gossip, but like all shinobi, that’s only in trivial matters. When it comes to classified information or deeply personal issues, she’s as withdrawn as her snakes. For whatever reason, she’s labeled Kakashi as someone worthy of protection, someone she respects enough to keep out of the rumors about her love life. 

If Anko respects him, that’s all Iruka needs to know. The rest, Iruka figures he’ll learn in another week, or further down the road, if Kakashi chooses to travel it with him. 

In another week, there can’t be anything farther from Iruka’s mind. 

Half a year ago, Iruka saw a piece of how his mother felt. While protecting Naruto, while believing he was about to die but that he had given his precious student long enough to escape, he learned her _relief_. Why she gave him that blood-soaked smile, why her own life meant little to her in that moment, compared to her son’s.

It’s not something Iruka ever wanted to learn. 

During the attack on Konoha, Iruka learns another piece, this time of the shinobi who carried him away. 

The children are scared. Iruka is scared, as are the other teachers, but they won’t show it. They might have led relatively peaceful lives while working at the academy, but each of them rose to at least chuunin before accepting positions as teachers. They aren’t strangers to fighting for their lives. They operate as a single, well-rehearsed unit, shepherding the kids to the Hokage heads and, hopefully, out of danger. 

The Sandaime’s face cracks. Iruka has never believed in portents, but fear licks at his heels as he pushes the children along. 

The air is solid with uncertainty and strain, the distant sounds of explosion and chaos barely reaching them, but ringing in the silence. The space is dry and dusty, but roomy and stocked with enough water and ration bars that they can stay inside for weeks if they have to. There are weapons, too, but they remain untouched for now. The instructors carry personal weapons on them, and the children… well, they aren’t going to be armed until the time comes. Right now, it would do more harm than good. 

It’s long past nightfall when a messenger arrives. One of the instructors is a Hyuuga, and he verifies with the byakugan the messenger’s identity. They allow him in and gather to hear the status report. 

Minutes later, Iruka is the one to tell Konohamaru that his grandfather is dead. Iruka is the one who restrains him from running outside, who holds him as he falls apart. And Iruka is the one who will fall apart behind closed doors. 

Just not now. Not while the children need him. Not while Konoha needs him.

As it turns out, Konoha needs him for the next three days. It’s twenty hours after the attack before the enemy’s retreat is confirmed and the village swept clear enough to allow the children to leave. Parents and guardians trickle in, but many are wounded or needed for emergency relief efforts, so the unclaimed children remain in the Hokage heads under the teacher’s rotating guard. Konohamaru falls asleep on Iruka’s lap three times, salt on his cheeks and scarf wrapped around his eyes to block out the light. When Iruka is relieved of duty on the second day, he doesn’t check to see if his apartment is still standing before reporting to the mission desk.

The damage to Konoha itself is minor compared to the destruction of the Kyuubi, but some key areas have been hit. One of them is a group home for orphans under academy age. None of the children were killed, their caregivers managing to get them to safety in time, but the ceiling is caved in, most of the supplies and belongings destroyed. New space isn’t a problem, but food and bedding are. There are stores in multiple warehouses around the village, and Iruka coordinates the assistant teachers in one to sort and transport the usable items. Some of the blankets are highly moth-eaten. It’s summer and no one is likely to freeze to death, so they discard the worst. The food stores have been kept in better shape. Iruka personally deals with the chuunin in charge of supplies to record all of the items taken. Rationing is a likelihood if security measures or attacks interrupt their supply chain.

The jounin, tokubetsu, and ANBU are in charge of security, so the chuunin fill in the gaps and deal with general relief effort. There’s a chuunin designated to organizing older genin, who primarily act as messengers between the various groups. Iruka catches sight of his most important people within forty hours of the attack, even including a flash of silver hair, but there’s no time for discussions. Iruka subsists on instant ramen from his thankfully intact apartment, without the vegetables and meat this time, and black coffee watered down with green tea. By the time of the sandaime’s funeral, the unholy concoction has almost started to taste good. 

There aren’t as many dead as in the Kyuubi attack, dozens instead of hundreds. It’s few enough that there will be individual memorial services over the next few days, back-to-back and lasting less than an hour each. Efficient. The first funeral is for the sandaime alone.

Iruka finds Konohamaru in the Sarutobi residence, already dressed in funeral blacks, goggles the only color left on his small body. They walk to the funeral together in silence. Standing at the front, the scent of the funeral incense is nearly overwhelming. People fill in around them, the children ushered to the front, and Naruto comes to stand on Konohamaru’s other side. Asuma is almost across the field, between Kurenai and Might Guy, and Konohamaru barely glances at him. Iruka doesn’t think there’s animosity between the two, but whatever their relationship is, it isn’t close enough to provide comfort to one another. Iruka is the only one Konohamaru has for that. 

He doesn’t consider his next actions, because they were never in doubt. As the crowd begins to fill the gaps, Iruka sets off a burst of chakra from his palm. 

It rains from above and at least two people turn to look in Iruka’s direction, one with a byakugan and another that must be a different sort of sensor. Neither of them seem alarmed, merely curious, and neither fixates on Iruka in specific. It’s enough that he won’t be able to do it again, though, not with everyone on high alert. This is his only moment. 

Iruka closes his eyes to focus on the chakra as it falls. It’s a cacophony of sensations, sizzling and popping and sliding and twirling, too much for Iruka to separate each individual. 

It all feels dead without the familiar brush of static. 

Konohamaru tries his best to hold it together, and Iruka thinks a lot of it is not wanting to lose face in front of Naruto. But his lips start to wobble and his breathing comes in sharp bursts and Iruka crouches down, wrapping an arm around his trembling form. Konohamaru turns and buries his head in Iruka’s chest. It’s started to rain. The precipitation is cold in comparison to the heat of Konohamaru’s tears as they seep through Iruka’s shirt. 

Iruka hasn’t cried yet. Now isn’t the time to start. 

“Iruka-sensei.” Naruto’s quiet voice interrupts the white noise of rainfall and too many bodies crammed in one space. “Why do people… sacrifice their own lives for others?”

Konohamaru’s sniffles abate, his attention shifting to the question even though he doesn’t lift his face. 

Iruka first thinks of his parents, then his own willingness to die for Naruto—for any of the precious children they guarded at Hokage rock. Then he looks to the visage of the Sandaime carved within the cliff, the gash that runs through his stone features as prominent as the one on Iruka’s face. He keeps his eyes on it as he speaks.

“When a person dies, they lose everything. The past, present, and future, are all lost.” Iruka says softly, but evenly, aware that most of the children that surround them can hear his voice whether they want to or not. “A lot of people die in battle, or while on a mission. They might also die because of a simple reason. Among all those who are dead, there are some that have dreams, goals… but everyone has something that is most important to them. Parents, siblings, friends, lovers, people of the village.” Students, precious children who don’t deserve to suffer the atrocities of the world, but will grow strong enough to face them despite. “These are very important people. We trust each other, help each other. We start forming these bonds from the moment we are born. As we grow, these bonds also grow, and become stronger.

“It’s a simple answer. Anyone with bonds like this would die for another… because they cherish them.”

Naruto’s brow creases as he looks down. Everything about Naruto is loud and proud, exposed for the world to see—but not now. His grief is somber and reflective, his gaze turned inwards as he tries to understand a concept he’s only just mature enough to fully grasp. “I think I understand what you’re trying to say… But… death is really painful.”

Konohamaru’s cries are persistent, but muffled, the sounds nearly lost beneath the rain. Iruka can feel small hands tremble as they fist into his shirt.

“Sandaime didn’t die for nothing.” The low voice is unexpected, and Iruka might have turned around if not for Konohamaru in his arms. As it is, he tilts his head just enough to see Kakashi standing behind Naruto. Kakashi’s tone is familiar, even if he’s only heard it once. It’s clear, honest, but not harsh. “He left us some important things. One day, you’ll understand.”

Naruto does understand. Iruka doesn’t know when it happened, when Naruto grew up. Iruka wishes he didn’t have to. But he’s proud. Naruto is strong. Konohamaru is strong. 

Iruka has to be strong for them. 

When the funeral ends, Team Seven heads off together and Iruka takes Konohamaru back to the Sarutobi estate. They dawdle, walking slowly, and Iruka thinks it’s because Konohamaru doesn’t want to be alone. So Iruka makes excuses to come inside, brews them both one of Hiruzen’s favorite teas, and they sit in silence as minutes crawl by. Eventually, Konohamaru asks Iruka to tell him about one of his old missions, a cool one, and Iruka obliges. Before he gets to the daring battle, Konohamaru is asleep on the couch. Iruka pulls a blanket over him, turns out the lights, and heads for the memorial stone. 

Except he doesn’t make it there. He stops at his ANBU’s tree. His dark fingers trace over the exposed wood, the message left, and he climbs the tree to sit on the branch. 

He expects the tears to come then, but they don’t. Exhaustion and grief war with one another, leaving a hollow pit in Iruka’s stomach where the pain should be. It’s there, somewhere, but he can’t find it yet. He’s gone too many days denying it, refusing to allow himself a moment to recognize his loss. Something still blocks him from letting go now, in the one place where he should feel safe. Where he’s _always_ felt safe.

He spends a long time in the tree, in the same spot where his ANBU always hid, watching the fluttering of the leaves until his tired eyes won’t stay open anymore and he curls his legs to his chest, wrapping his arms around them and pressing the strong metal of his hitai-ate into his knees. It stretches the scar tissue on his back, but it’s healed enough that it isn’t pain anymore. It’s a slight ache, a ghostly reminder of what used to be. 

Just like this place. 

When Iruka feels chakra approaching, he thinks it’s someone come to mourn, but they aren’t heading from the direction of the path that leads to the memorial stone. They’re coming through the woods. Iruka tenses, ready to press his hands into seals if necessary, but the village has been thoroughly flushed of enemies so he calms his instinctive paranoia and doesn’t leap to his feet. Soon, he sees a gray figure flash through the trees.

An ANBU stands before him, bracing on a tree branch about eight yards away. 

Iruka’s ANBU.

Short gray hair streaks the trees, pale skin with a curling red tattoo exposed on the bicep. A sword rests on his back and the empty sockets of the dog mask stare back at Iruka. Dark fabric covers his throat, but that’s not unusual with ANBU, Iruka knows. They hide as much of their body as they reasonably can. The shinobi’s posture is ramrod straight, shoulders set high and tense as if awaiting orders. He’s tall now, taller than Iruka remembers, and there are no streaks of blood or evidence of wounds beneath the armor. His legs are long and muscled, bandages wrapped tight around his right thigh to holster a kunai. 

He looks... good. Healthy. Strong. Older, but he was just a wiry teen when Iruka last saw him. Iruka was a child himself, for that matter. Neither of them are now. There’s breadth to his ANBU’s shoulders, a narrow taper to his waist and hips, and steel beneath his skin. Power radiates from him, but not danger. Iruka’s heart beats quickly, and it has nothing to do with fear or the intense awareness of the bloody life his ANBU has led, not like the first time they met. 

His ANBU is _here_. Letting Iruka see him. He’s _not dead_. 

Every person important to Iruka is safe now. 

Everyone except the Sandaime. 

This is what he was waiting for, unknowingly, not allowing himself to grieve until he knew exactly what he was grieving for. He feels his features crumple, and heat starts to build behind his eyes but it still won’t condense into the tears he thinks should come. 

His ANBU looks strong. Full of life. But nearly a decade has passed since they met in person. He had no doubt killed a few and saved many. Lost and fought and found happiness, large or small. He had an entire life, with people who knew his name and face and ambitions, while Iruka walked a different line, two moons revolving the same planet but in different orbits, only catching sight of each other at specific points. Those small points don’t form into a whole picture, not at all.

All Iruka knows is what he sees, what he knows: patience, kindness, strength, loyalty. 

Everything that Iruka wants to be and wants to feel.

But it isn’t his to touch.

“You always come.” 

Iruka’s voice is raspy, filed away by stress and lack of sleep and all of the emotions that he won’t let himself feel. They seize his vocal cords in a vice. He licks chapped lips, parched because all of his body’s hydration is going to the extra blood pumping in his ears and the liquid that exerts pressure behind his sinuses and refuses to burst free.

He doesn’t know if it’s possible to startle an ANBU, but there’s an immediate reaction. A tremor runs through him like a rope pulling taut, and bark splinters beneath gloved fingers as they dig into the tree. Perhaps Iruka should be wary, but he feels no bloodlust or warning. Whatever his ANBU _is_ feeling, the red lines of his mask does not betray.

“Not always when I want you.” Iruka amends, because how many days had he sat the stone waiting for something exactly like this? “But when I _need_ you.” 

No verbal response comes, but there’s a change to his ANBU’s stance, a slight unbalance as if he’s going to start listing towards the tree but hasn’t quite gotten there yet. He must be run far more ragged than Iruka. He can only imagine what the ANBU have gone through with all of this, and that’s even without the emotional stress of whoever, or whatever, the man might have lost.

“I thought you were dead. I tried to sense you, at the funeral.” Iruka confesses, an admission of something he intellectually understands he should feel guilty for, but right now his sense of honor is deadened by the sheer importance of this moment. His eyes drink in his ANBU’s form, try to see past his mask, because he doesn’t think this will ever happen again and he wants to cherish things before they leave for good. “I dunno if there were too many people, or if you weren’t there, but I thought the worst. I know I shouldn’t have tried, but I needed to know.” 

If Iruka is expecting recriminations, he doesn’t receive them. His ANBU’s only visible reaction is to relax his grip on the branch, finally leaning that scant half-inch closer to the trunk of the tree on which he is perched. Iruka rests his forehead on his knees again, squeezing his eyes shut. His lids slide down like rusted shutters, requiring force but then impossible to open again. His lips brush the soft cloth of his funeral slacks as he whispers. “But you’re here now. You always come. How do you always do that? Why? Why do you always help me? It’s not like I’ve done anything for you.” 

He inhales the scent of cotton and detergent, strange compared to the sweaty uniform he’d only changed once in the several previous days. The fabric filters the smells of the forest, the decaying leaves and pine needles and his ANBU. Iruka’s hands slide to his calves and his nails dig into the meat of them through his pants. He wants to stop talking, but he doesn’t think he can. Not now that his thoughts are finally spilling from his tongue like turpentine. The pressure is building, worse, his temples pounding with it. “You’ve seen some of the worst parts of me. I know you must have been here, watching, before I found you the first time.” 

Moisture clings to his eyelashes like precipitation, too fine to fall. But it’s enough to open his sticky lids. He raises his head, meeting his ANBU’s void gaze. The man’s head is tilted slightly to the side, in curiosity or confusion or perhaps critical analysis. The motion tugs at Iruka’s mind, plucking strings of familiarity, but he can’t focus well enough to discern the origin of the tune. He’s on a roll now. Iruka has never been good at doing things halfway, never been able to navigate the emotional mazes of caring just enough rather than too much. To some degree, Iruka has been holding himself back since the first day he noticed he was being watched, and it’s all finally bursting forth like a pressure valve released, the only control on the flow exerted by the forces of loss and exhaustion. Iruka needs to know if the ANBU even _wants_ his care, or if Iruka is throwing precious supplies overboard by giving a damn. He’ll cut himself open to find out.

“I hated that thought, at first. That you’d been watching me. But... after a while, it was freeing. There was someone who had already seen all of that. Someone that kept watching when he could have left. It didn’t matter to me whether you were judging me for it, not at first, because you stayed anyway. You… you were there, so it didn’t matter if you thought I was stupid, or useless, or annoying. You were _there_ , unlike everyone else. They just pretended I didn’t exist until I did something wrong. And I had no idea who you were, anyway, so it was safe for you to hate me. I didn’t care, as long as you were _there_.” God, that’s so much like Naruto. Iruka should have done more. He squares his jaw, but the words keep tumbling out, verve working past any chinks of self-restraint. “But now, I want to know what you were thinking all those times. I want to know who you’re mourning here. I want to know why you came to me at the hospital, after Mizu—” 

A sob threatens to burst forth and Iruka’s throat convulses around it. Is Mizuki alive? Was he alive at the time of the attack? If so, did he survive it? Iruka hates that he doesn’t know what to hope for. Inhaling sharply, he closes his eyes and regains his hold over his expression. Remembering Mizuki should make it harder, should remind Iruka that exposing too much of yourself is dangerous, but it doesn’t. If anything, it spurns Iruka on, because he held himself back for so many years—from accepting the truth of his oldest friend’s insanity, from treating Naruto with the love he deserved, from telling his ANBU exactly how much he cared. Iruka doesn’t want to do that anymore. 

“I lost the Sandaime. My friend and my mentor. But you could have lost someone. A friend, a mother, a brother, a teammate, a lover. Maybe you need someone to listen, too. I want to know why you care, and why you stopped coming, and why you’re here for me now. ANBU-san… I want to know _you_.” 

A sharp hiss meets Iruka’s ears, something just too restrained to be a gasp. It’s the same breathless, non-vocalized sound his ANBU made when Iruka fucked up his healing jutsu. It’s pained. It makes him snap his eyes open, lean forward against his knees, desperately rush on because he recognizes that he’s overstepped his bounds and he’s not _trying_ to drive the man away, even if he mostly expects that to be the result. “I know you can’t tell me your name. I know that. That’s not what I…” ...want, need, dream about... “that’s not what I’m asking for. I don’t need your real name, ANBU-san. I would never ask that of you. I just…” 

Iruka’s floundering now, his mind moving too fast, filtering through various thoughts and wishes and daydreams that have colored his desires over the years, quickly determining which are the ones he truly needs. Iruka has spent a lot of time examining his own personality in the last few months. Hard not to, when so much of what he thought he knew has been turned around. He _thinks_ he knows what he truly wants now, and what parts are just childish fantasies or selfish desires to boost his own ego. 

“I want to be there for you, too. Even if you can’t tell me anything. I feel so pathetic, sometimes, always showing you my worst side.” Iruka’s eyes have been unfocused, but now he brings them back to his ANBU’s face, wishing he could see anything from that heartless mask. “I want… I want to support you, too.”

His ANBU doesn’t speak. 

Iruka has started to think he’s truly mute, perhaps from an injury to his throat. That could explain the fabric that cloaks it. But surely he could find a way to communicate _something_. 

There’s no visible sign that he’s heard Iruka. He stands there, for stretching moments, and Iruka waits, but nothing comes. 

Disappointment builds acrid in Iruka’s mouth. The longer he waits, the more he’s reminded of a teacher waiting out a small child’s tantrum, of a man reluctantly waiting out a storm in which he’s trapped. Iruka stews in the acid concoction of his own words until he can’t take it anymore, until even his optimism has to beat itself over the head with the recognition of its own naivete. 

Apparently, that’s the answer he’s going to get. 

“God, that sounds so stupid.” Iruka tries to laugh, because that’s what he always does when he has to hide his tears, what he’s done since his school days, but apparently he can’t even do that right because it comes out bitter and discordant. 

He needs to get away, needs to get back to his apartment, because this is as clear a sign as any that Iruka isn’t going to find what he was looking for here. His legs are shaky underneath him, and his lips keep running as he stretches weary muscles to stand. “I don’t know what I’m thinking. You probably have people, friends or someone else who can listen—right? You don’t need _me_. I’m the one who needs comfort from a damn mask.” 

He doesn’t mean to say that. He really doesn’t, because he’s not sure he’s even talking about his ANBU anymore. He’s always looked for comfort in masks. Mizuki’s mask of friendship, his ANBU’s mask of comfort, Naruto’s mask of confidence, Iruka’s own mask of kindness—hell, even Kakashi’s _literal_ mask, literal because Iruka’s spiraling thoughts can’t immediately come up with a way that the Copy-nin has tried to trick Iruka even once in their acquaintanceship, other than maybe with bullshit excuses and—

Exhaustion clogs his brain, from so much more than just sleep, but Iruka is still a shinobi. He stumbles back when a gray blur fills his vision, heart stalling and hand reaching for a kunai that isn’t there. His back hits the tree trunk and Iruka has a single instant of fear before his eyes refocus on the white and crimson that fill his world from only an inch away. 

Inhaling with a sharp gasp, Iruka’s heart restarts along with his lungs. He’s not being touched, he recognizes first, and there are no weapons in his ANBU’s hands. He feels no killing intent, and that wouldn’t make sense anyway. If Iruka can put up with thirty pre-genin, an ANBU can put up with one bratty chuunin. But the ANBU is so close that their chests almost touch. If Iruka was wearing his flak vest instead of the thin cloth of funeral garb, they _would_ be touching. The empty sockets of the mask align with Iruka’s, which leads him to realize that his ANBU’s head is tilted down, bending towards Iruka until their height difference—which isn’t as large as he had thought—comes to nothing. He can hear his ANBU’s breathing, fast and light, and there’s no way his chakra should have a physical effect, but Iruka feels electricity dance along his skin anyway, feels the hairs on his arms and neck stand with the power of the charge. 

When his ANBU’s hand slowly lifts, palm to the side, long fingers extending and descending as if to cup Iruka’s cheek, he can feel the warmth of the touch even though it hasn’t occurred yet. Its anticipation glowing in his chest, his ANBU’s presence and the rich scent of coffee enveloping him. The lack of space between them makes Iruka overly aware of every breath they take, and it’s the strongest thing Iruka has allowed himself to feel for three days. Longer, really. 

His ANBU freezes, his palm hovering so close to Iruka’s skin that he can feel it rather than see it, frisson dancing in the space between them. A tear falls from Iruka’s chin, darkening the bark beneath their feet. He waits for the rest of the flood to come, but it doesn’t. It’s a single tear, and then his ANBU moves again, his outstretched palm coming to rest on Iruka’s shoulder in the same manner it had so many years before, in the clearing Iruka can barely see through the sparse foliage of fall trees. This time it exerts a gentle pressure, as if he’s afraid Iruka will fall unless he relies on the stability of the tree. 

There’s no way to describe the touch other than _tender_ , and although the dog mask is just as stoic, soulless as before, pupils and eyes hidden in an unnatural, permanent shadow, Iruka can feel gravity against his skin where his stare touches. It’s stupid, fanciful, irrational, but hope does that to a person. His ANBU’s fingers flex, squeezing comfortingly, and that hope surges even higher until Iruka’s afraid of the impact if it crashes down. 

The fingers flex again, and then a smaller point of pressure, a rhythm tapping against Iruka’s collarbone. It’s a dull sensation at first, half-ignored because Iruka doesn’t recognize the importance. The taps become harder, more insistent, and then Iruka _does_ , and the dull spots of awareness become as bright as solar flares. Iruka’s brow furrows and his lips curl around the syllables. Shinobi shorthand code is more difficult to discern when the vocabulary isn’t relevant to battle tactics. But his ANBU pauses between each word, allowing Iruka time to piece the sounds together and form the whole of each concept. 

_‘Respect.’_ The first idea seems ambiguous at first without the context of noun or verb, subject and object. But though the meaning doesn’t immediately click, the weight of it remains, because it’s the _first word_ his ANBU has ever said to him, even if it isn’t spoken at all. 

_‘Admire’_ comes next, and Iruka inspects it along with the first, changing the ‘respect’ from a directive to a relay of information, a connection between two people. With his ANBU’s form so close to his own, with the intimacy of the negligible distance between them, near enough the short strands of gray might touch Iruka’s hitai-ate if not for the mask pushing them back... there is no question as to who his ANBU is building said connection between. 

_‘Care’_ is third, and it’s accompanied by a stutter of breath. Iruka can’t tear his wondered stare from his ANBU’s masked features long enough to check visibly, but he can feel the fast rise and fall of his ANBU’s chest, the tensity in long muscles that give the impression of holding back, carefully maintaining the space between them despite a magnet urging them closer.

_‘Trust.’_ Iruka’s lips stay curled around that one for too long, savoring the taste of it on his tongue. Pride brews slowly, dripping into Iruka’s daze. _His ANBU trusts him_ , and Iruka knows how hard-earned true trust can be, how greatly it can destroy when given with haste. His ANBU surely does, too, but not only has he decided to _trust_ Iruka—average, disappointing Iruka—he wants Iruka to _know_ it, and that is as important as the faith itself. 

_‘Protect.’_ Iruka’s breath hitches, and so does his ANBU’s, fingers stalling their frantic pace. Iruka hasn’t felt _protected_ since his parents died. The concept curls around him like smoke, embracing him with the comfort it brings. The heat that has been pooling and building behind Iruka’s eyes for days begins to recede, surging to his cheeks instead, heating his skin, his chest, his neck, his ears. 

_‘Affection.’_

It’s that last admission that breaks Iruka. His stomach swoops like something dropped from on high, condensing the electricity in his body into a single charge that forces him into movement. Iruka shoots forward, fingers wrapping around a slender wrist, and his ANBU _lets him_. He doesn’t flinch. His head tilts forward a fraction more, possibly to see the contrast of brown skin and black leather, but makes no move to back away. It drives home, more than the word itself, that his ANBU really does _trust_ him.

“ANBU-san—” Iruka begins, the urge to return the sentiments, to ensure they both meet halfway, bubbling from his lips. His ANBU flicks his wrist from Iruka’s hold, reversing the grasp until it’s soft leather that wraps around tanned flesh. The tapping begins anew, but it only consists of two syllables.

_‘Inu.’_

A… dog? Iruka is halfway to looking around for a stray canine when his gaze falls on a curled porcelain mouth, pricked ears, rimmed eyes. Realization shoots through him. The gift he’s given this time isn’t a descriptor, but a _name_.

Somehow it’s this, more than anything else, that makes Iruka long to surge forward, to take this gift and unwrap every layer until he can lovingly caress the man beneath. Romantic and sexual attraction have never entered Iruka’s mind when he’s thought of his ANBU, not a single time. When they initially met, Iruka was still figuring out his attraction to men and the disparity in their abilities created, in the genin’s view, an unbridgable chasm between them that couldn’t be crossed by something as sinful as sex. It was also simpler that way, and part of Iruka had longed to keep that simple innocence, even as he grew older and saw the beauty in the masculine form, experienced the desire to join his body with another’s. 

Romance and sex don’t enter the equation now, either, even though his ANBU is close enough to kiss. Not romance and sex exactly, at least. The desire Iruka feels is so innate, buried in his core and pushing him for everything, _anything_ he can get, that Iruka can’t begin to characterize it as love or lust. It’s just....

“Inu-san.” He breathes in awe. 

His ANBU— _Inu’s_ —fingers stutter, and a ripple passes through his body in an unquestionable response as real as any language. The pattern unravels into chaos before his ANBU restrains it. He clenches his fist for a second before starting anew, with an urgency Iruka wants to drink in like an elixir. _‘I—’_

Birdsong parts the air, a flapping of wings and then a repeated cry. It’s a signal, but not one Iruka can decode. It must be meant for the ANBU, because Inu whips his head to the side and stares in the bird’s direction, going unnaturally still. He slowly turns back to Iruka.

The message is clear. Their time is up. The world around them has somehow kept turning. 

“You can find me.” Iruka murmurs. He wants to say more, but they are shinobi first. There is never a question of that. “ _Please_ find me.”

Inu squeezes Iruka’s wrist and leans back. Iruka releases him, hand falling to rest at his side, empty and adrift. Inu starts to remove his fingers, but he lingers for one more moment, a parting phrase. _‘Be safe.’_

Leaves swirl in Inu’s place. 

Iruka visits the memorial stone. He cries. He releases all of the sorrow he can in liquid drops and hoarse sobs and swollen eyes. He remembers a kind old man who gave Iruka a purpose, first in his mother’s jutsu and then in the Will of Fire. He remembers the burn of smoke and steady hands measuring tea leaves. He remembers a man who believed in the good of those around him, who cared for every soul in the village as if they shared the same blood. Iruka fears for Konoha, for her crumbling walls and her inhabitants who are left without a leader. He grieves for Konohamaru, yet another child who has lost his family, and then grieves for the ones that he doesn’t see. 

Then he finds his bed, sleeps for five hours, drinks a bitter concoction of green tea and coffee, and goes back to work.

Inu is a steady presence in the back of Iruka’s mind over the next days. Iruka doesn’t search for him, either through his jutsu or otherwise. There are plenty of things to fixate on. Buildings to be reconstructed, fresh food deliveries that have to be met and escorted for miles because security has tightened ten fold. They are vulnerable both in numbers and political strength without the figurehead of a Hokage. There are whispers of Jiraiya donning the mantle, even a few whispers of Hatake Kakashi. Iruka’s thoughts on that second option are conflicted, too numerous to coalesce into a single sentiment. 

Four days pass. He visits Rock Lee in the hospital and is unsurprised to see Might Guy in the room. Iruka never stays long, unwilling to intrude on Guy’s private suffering, but he doesn’t want to forget any of the children in Konoha. He only assisted with Lee’s class a few times before their graduation, but he’s fond of the kid’s stupid bravery. It’s too much like Naruto and Iruka’s not to strike a cord. 

“Are you visiting Sasuke-kun next, Iruka-sensei?” Guy asks as Iruka turns to leave. His tone is subdued but polite, the way he’s been since the end of the preliminaries. 

“Sasuke?”

Guy blinks at Iruka’s evident confusion. “Were you not aware? Kakashi and Sasuke-kun were admitted yesterday!” 

For once, Guy is tight-lipped. He won’t give Iruka details except to say that Sasuke and Kakashi are in (temporary, just as Lee’s injuries will most certainly resolve with the ardent fervor for life!) comas following a powerful genjutsu, and that Naruto has left with Jiraiya for reasons unstated (of course he would have informed his beloved sensei, but they left straight from the village gates, young passion pushing them to expediency, but don’t worry, they are strong, youthful shinobi full of vigor and—). The words ring hollow, undeserving of even capitalization. They hit Iruka with the impact of an earth jutsu. 

He saw Naruto yesterday. _Yesterday_. He hasn’t seen Kakashi and Sasuke since the funeral, but how could this happen so quickly? Why did they even leave the village walls? Was there a lingering enemy in Konoha? If so, why would Guy refuse to give details? Why hasn’t Iruka heard about an altercation so close to home? It’s obvious that Sasuke and Kakashi’s conditions can’t be hidden for long, not if they are truly in comas with unknown dates of recovery, but why are the circumstances concealed? 

Kakashi still owes him dinner. 

Iruka finds the jounin’s room first, because it turns out to be only a few doors down from the nurse’s station where Iruka asks. He slides the door open warily, but there’s no one inside other than Kakashi. It’s a relief. Iruka doesn’t have a clue how to explain his tenuous relationship with Kakashi to anyone else.

The hitai-ate is gone. The first thing that catches Iruka’s attention is the textured scar that runs through Kakashi’s left eye, bisecting his eyebrow and cutting down the pale skin of his cheek. It disappears beneath the edge of his cloth mask, which is still in place due to some conscientious medic. (Or just anyone who valued their life.) The wound is deep enough to have pierced the eyeball. The original eyeball. Now, there’s a bloody red sharingan, Iruka knows, concealed by an ivory lid. 

Kakashi is pale and vulnerable, a marble statue against the white sheets. His hair falls in silver tufts against the pillow, spikier than usual now that it isn’t forced to the side by a crooked hitai-ate. His chest rises and falls in deep breaths. The only sign that he isn’t merely asleep is the thin sheen of sweat that glistens on his forehead, and the fact that no ex-ANBU would fail to wake from the intensity with which Iruka stares. 

Kakashi is dead to the world. 

How?

Iruka knows people can recover from comas. The definition of a coma to begin with is loose and often ill-fitting. Some only last days. Iruka has never heard specifics of a coma induced by genjutsu, doesn’t know if that makes it more or less likely that Kakashi will wake. That Sasuke will. 

This close, Kakashi looks younger than he is, features soft and unguarded. Fur of many colors sprinle the ebony of his jounin shirt, something Iruka has never noticed before. Where are his ninken? Summons are allowed in hospitals, within reason, but an entire pack might be too much. Can they even reach him without being called? Iruka thinks Kakashi lives with them, but then again, the Copy-nin’s offhand statements probably aren’t to be trusted as factual. Surely someone can communicate with them if they are in Konoha. Guy or Kurenai. Iruka doesn’t know what the dogs even look like, other than a vague drawing of a squashed-face mutt. 

Iruka slumps in the chair beside Kakashi, eyes tracing over the modley of colors that span Kakashi’s sleeve. Long and short, coarse and silky, dark brown, white, tan, gray, rust—

Iruka’s heart beats once. Twice. Stops. 

Starts again, sluggish but picking up speed. His lungs don’t oxygenate his blood properly, making him feel like the air is too thin to breathe. 

Dilated pupils take in the dog fur, the pale skin, the black cloth that covers a slender throat, the silver hair that is lengthy and shiny but no longer slanted from a hitai-ate, the lean muscles, the tapered waist, the long fingers that are now entirely bare but Iruka can easily see clad in leather, the height that he normally thinks of as equivalent to his own, but perhaps, with the subtraction of slouching, leaning, generally poor posture that makes Iruka’s teacher heart hurt just to look at him…

It’s crazy. It’s obvious. It’s unbelievable. It’s undeniable.

It needs proof. 

Iruka’s palm is sweaty, but that doesn’t affect the chakra that builds in the center. It’s less than usual, only enough to cover the single hospital room. Everything Iruka cares about is laying in the narrow bed. 

He breathes once, twice, feels his pulse pound a dozen beats in that short period—and breaks the seals. 

Yang chakra surges towards the sky, high enough to pass the permeable barrier of the ceiling. It descends slowly, excruciatingly so, fluttering like leaves in a soft breeze, and Iruka barely closes his eyes in time to focus on the fireworks behind his eyelids. 

The reaction isn’t subtle, because Kakashi isn’t awake to control it, isn’t concealing his presence in the least. It’s loud, and violent, and shakes Iruka’s bones with startling intensity. It’s a clap of thunder, a bolt of lightning across a black sky, an electrical charge surging through stripped-thin nerves. 

It’s Inu. 

It’s his ANBU. 

It’s Kakashi.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alternatively titled, Chapter 11: In Which Shit Finally Happens


	12. Chapter 12

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so grateful to each of you who have commented, and I get ridiculously excited every time I see a notification in my inbox. <3 I hope you all enjoy this chapter!

Hatake Kakashi. Kakashi of the Sharingan. Man of a Thousand Jutsu. Friend-Killer Kakashi. Cold-Blooded Kakashi. The Copy-nin. 

Inu. 

Iruka’s ANBU. 

_Fuck_.

Irrational paranoia links the concepts of ‘ANBU’ and ‘real name’ to create a daisy chain of panic in Iruka’s mind. He stares wide-eyed at Kakashi’s face, waiting for the man to jerk awake and accuse him of treason for actively confirming an ANBU’s identity. He shoots vigilant glances at the windows, the door, the walls because, as they teach in the Academy, the ANBU have eyes and ears in every corner of Konoha. 

When nothing happens and Kakashi doesn’t move, Iruka makes a sincere effort to divert himself back to semi-rational thought. If Kakashi was wearing a heart monitor, Iruka would attach it to himself just to watch the numbers climb. He takes a deep breath of chemical-scented air, in through his nose, out through his mouth, and stares unseeingly at the scar running down Kakashi’s cheek. He tries to do what he teaches his students, to run through the problem one step at a time.

The immediate, logistical concern that truly makes Iruka wonder if he’s going crazy, is that Kakashi’s not in ANBU. He _was_ , obviously, but he’s Team Seven’s jounin-sensei now, and he’s been performing regular missions for years. Sure, it’s possible that Inu wasn’t in ANBU for at least some of Iruka’s meetings with him, but he met Inu in person just the other day wearing the full kit and kaboodle. Iruka isn’t privy to the inner-workings of Konoha’s special forces, but he doesn’t think it’s something you go in or out of at the drop of a hat. Did Kakashi get recalled temporarily because of the attack on Konoha? Is there such a thing as a temporary assignment in ANBU? 

Wait. No. There’s another discrepancy, something that no doubt played a major role in why Iruka hadn’t recognized Kakashi to begin with, because he likes to think that he isn’t a totally blind moron. Maybe half-blind.

The problem is… their hair is different. The Inu of Iruka’s memories had silver hair, but it was short and spiky, a duller matte than what Iruka is staring at now. Perhaps that can be put off to hormonal, dietary, and product changes over the years, but Inu’s hair from less than a week ago perfectly fits Iruka’s image from the past. The Kakashi before him does not. Hair can’t change quality and grow two inches within a few days. 

A transformation jutsu can. 

If Kakashi used a transformation jutsu to appear as Inu… what did that mean? Kakashi could have been recalled to ANBU and only faked his hair in order to disguise his true identity, the same way he used shinobi shorthand instead of speaking and gave Iruka only a codename (and ‘Hound’ couldn’t fit any more perfectly, Iruka realizes wryly). Which means that Kakashi went to great lengths to avoid Iruka discovering who he was. 

That’s the real kick in the chest, the part that makes Iruka rise to his feet, pacing the small length of the room while keeping Kakashi’s comatose form in his periphery.

Iruka can’t fault Kakashi for acting as though nothing was strange when they first met in person. He knows ANBU can’t reveal their identities so easily, even if they’re no longer in the service. But… surely he could have just… _let_ Iruka figure it out, at least this last time. He doubts there are specific rules stating an ANBU must use a transformation jutsu to disguise their true self even to their own people, people who know them outside of the mask. Or, well, maybe there _are_ rules like that and Iruka’s shock is making him unreasonable.

A year-long mission. That’s what Iruka assumed when his ANBU disappeared and then left a message shortly after the summer festival. Iruka tries to remember what time of year Kakashi started coming around the mission desk, when Iruka began noticing his name pop up on the list of returning shinobi. Maybe spring? It wasn’t any later than that, because Iruka knew him well enough to be annoyed after discovering the relationship between Anko and Kakashi. 

Anko and _Inu_. Somehow that tastes just as sour. Inu’s existence has always been _Iruka’s_ , at least in one way. It’s nothing but childish possessiveness that Iruka will chastise himself for later, but knowing that Kakashi—Inu—was sleeping with Anko while letting Iruka believe he was dead… it makes him want to punch something. 

Hard. 

Physical pain would be welcome compared to the raw emotion quickening his breaths, churning his stomach in nauseous swirls. 

The only thing that keeps Iruka from walking out, escaping the stifling room and breaking open a bottle of sake to drink away this entire day, is the memory of words pressed into his skin. 

Iruka remembers them. How could he not? It’s only been days, but he’s repeated them to himself dozens of times, convincing himself it was a promise Inu would actually find him outside of a life-or-death situation for once. _‘Respect.’ ‘Admire.’ ‘Care.’ ‘Trust.’ ‘Protect.’ ‘Affection.’_ The way he grasped Iruka’s wrist as if holding on for life, the way his fingers stuttered when Iruka breathed his codename. The way Inu pressed intimately close, the way he shivered, the way the bark of the tree splintered beneath his fingers when he first arrived.

Iruka tries to mesh that with Hatake Kakashi, the lazy bastard who reads porn while handing in awful reports. Except, Iruka can’t quite remember the last time _Icha Icha Paradise_ blocked out the view of Kakashi’s face. That must have stopped at some point, perhaps when he began turning in his reports solely to Iruka and purposefully including ridiculous errors so that Iruka would yell at him for them. Which Iruka initially interpreted as an eccentric jounin pulling his strings for a kick, but paired with Inu, paired with _‘respect’, ‘admire’, ‘affection’_ , it seems much more like an attempt to keep the attention of someone Kakashi missed.

Why did he stop going to the memorial stone? Given the timelines, Iruka knows that Kakashi wasn’t deep undercover in a foreign country. If Kakashi was able to go to the mission desk almost solely on Iruka’s shifts, then he certainly could have made their times at the memorial coincide as well. It would have almost been _more_ difficult for their visits to never correspond. And he evidently hadn’t ceased going to the memorial stone entirely; Kurenai’s words and his presence there after the chuunin exam meeting made that clear enough. 

So Kakashi has been avoiding him for years. For whatever reason, he no longer wants to listen to Iruka at the memorial stone. But making a hobby of annoying him and showing up after every major fuck-up of Iruka’s life is perfectly fine.

“You stupid, insane bastard.” Iruka hisses, leaning over Kakashi’s bed and glaring daggers at the unconscious man. If Kakashi didn’t look so damn fragile, Iruka would have jabbed him in the ribs hard enough to wake the dead. He has to cross his arms to restrain the impulse. He trembles with repressed rage, combined with consternation and a hurt so profound that it shakes him apart like an ancient stone monolith crumbling under the weight of a magnitude nine earthquake. “What the hell were you thinking, you _asshole_ , you—you two-faced, _capricious_ —”

The door slides open. Iruka nearly jumps back in alarm. Two jounin stand in the doorway, and Kurenai’s expression reads mild curiosity. 

“Oh, don’t stop on our account, sensei.” Asuma’s grinning at him. “It’s not often I get to hear someone cuss Kakashi out. It’d be even better if he was awake.”

Iruka’s face has to be redder than a tomato, because it feels as though he could catch ice on fire with just a touch. He opens his mouth to reply, but mortification renders him mute and he snaps his jaw shut with an audible click. 

“You’re not planning on stabbing him in his sleep, are you?” Asuma’s tone practically drips with amusement, and Iruka swears he sees Kurenai’s lips twitch. “‘Cause I gotta say, I’d expect more bravery from someone who called us out during the chuunin exams.” 

“I’d never—” Iruka stutters, taking a subconscious step back from the bed. “I didn’t mean to—”

“It’s fine, Iruka-sensei.” Kurenai says simply as she sets a book on the nightstand beside Kakashi. It has a garish yellow cover and a bright green title. “Asuma’s sense of humor is as bad as Kakashi’s.” 

Asuma smirks, unabashed. Iruka presses his lips together, taking a deep breath, hoping to soothe the red glow from his ears. After a moment, he feels confident enough to speak without dissolving to senseless utterances. “I was here to see someone else when I heard about Sasuke-kun and Kakashi-sensei. Is there any word on when they might wake up?”

Asuma’s smile drops at that, a crease forming between his brows. “They’re working on something, but no clue how long it could take. Maybe days, maybe months.” 

No details beyond that are offered, so Iruka makes his excuses and leaves, taking one last glance of Kakashi’s vulnerable face with him. 

Pity. That’s the best explanation Iruka can find after stomping halfway across Konoha. It sort of fits. Why Kakashi listened to him for so long, the dinner after the jounin-sensei meeting, why he showed up at the hospital and after the Sandaime’s funeral, why he carved a message in his tree. Even the damn blanket, which became a large factor in how Iruka figured this out at all. The thought of Kakashi pitying him that much makes Iruka want to die and kill something all at once. He ends up just biting his lip until it bleeds. 

When he reaches the training grounds, he releases his anger with kunai and shuriken; with the motion of the draw back and release, the subtle whistle in the air, the satisfying thud as metal embeds into wood. He’ll have to sharpen all of them after this, but it’s worth it for the stress relief while he thinks. 

If Kakashi pities him, Iruka will trap him in a String Light barrier with five exploding tags, jounin or not.

But his physical reactions as Inu… Iruka doesn’t think those were faked, and neither do they correspond with pity. The interactions at the mission desk even without Iruka knowing him as Inu, the way Kakashi explained his standpoint regarding the chuunin exams instead of dismissing him… they all lend credence to Inu’s admissions. ‘Respect.’ Iruka doesn’t think of respect and pity as partners that can coexist. Surely the former would erase the latter.

What of Inu’s other testimony?

Iruka tries to imagine the event with Hatake Kakashi in place of Inu. A cloth mask rather than ANBU, intense gray eye and hitai-ate rather than empty voids. In that moment, Kakashi drew so, so close. Close enough to kiss, without the barriers between them. Close enough that Iruka could feel the heat of his body, close enough to feel Kakashi shiver in authentic response. 

Kunai and shuriken lay embedded in the three poles of the training field, but Iruka makes no move to retrieve them. His hands clench into fists at his sides and his skin begins to heat with more than the rays of the summer sun. 

He thinks of Kakashi’s voice making those same confessions. Kakashi, leaning in to whisper in his ear. Breath caressing Iruka’s flushed face, smooth baritone and lithe form curling around him like a lover. He imagines Kakashi closing the last of that space, pressing against Iruka to speak those words into Iruka’s throat, his lips, his thigh... 

Iruka groans and crouches, wrists on his knees and eyes squeezed shut as he tries to breathe in some sanity. “You fucking bastard.” 

For the first time, Iruka knows that his ANBU won’t be at the memorial stone. So he goes to the mission desk. While the village is cleared of threats, relief efforts are ongoing and there’s no time for emotional crises. Duty comes first. He can think while he works. Regular missions will resume within the week, but there are posted lists of things that need done around the village: buildings that need repairs, supplies that have to be moved or catalogued, extra guard shifts at various stations around the perimeter. Iruka examines the list of tasks recommended for chuunins and picks up a pencil to write his initials next to a job. A voice stops him. 

“Hey. Iruka-sensei, yeah?” A man greets, lips stretching into an easygoing smile around a senbon. His vest labels him as a tokubetsu, and Iruka takes a moment to remember his name. 

“Genma-san.” Iruka recalls him from the chuunin exam meetings, as well as sightings at the _Sharpened Kunai_. He can’t recall his reports, so either Iruka doesn’t receive them or they aren’t horrible enough to note. He’s confident they’ve never spoken personally. 

“Actually, I was about to look for you, so this is great timing.” Shiranui Genma stuffs his hands in his pockets and rocks back on his heels. 

“Me?” Iruka asks dully. “What can I do for you?”

“Anko says you specialize in fūinjutsu traps.” His senbon flicks to the other side of his mouth and his jaw flexes. His eyes are sharp, calculating, despite a nonchalant manner. The dichotomy is painfully reminiscent of Kakashi. “I’m leading a squad beyond the north wall. A couple miles out, there’s reports of some chakra hotspots, maybe something by Sand or Sound. We’ve got a Hyuuga and Inuzuka to find them, but you can assist in defusing.” 

There’s a part of Iruka that’s exceptionally gratified Anko thinks so highly of his skill. There’s another part that knows the dangers of overestimating himself. Both parts cause him to flush and reach a hand up to scratch at his scar. “I’m not exactly an expert. Most of my knowledge of advanced fūinjutsu is purely theoretical.” He’s practicing higher ranked ones, sure, and has more books on the matter than the Konoha library, but he’s nowhere near a level of mastery. The Sandaime was more talented than Iruka by far, although that could be said with literally anything. The man wasn’t called ‘The Professor’ for nothing. 

Iruka misses the Sandaime now more than ever.

“Can you suggest anyone in Konoha who could do better?”

Iruka hesitates. “Er, not that I can think of.”

“Then meet us at the north gates in an hour. Maybe you’ll get that practical experience, huh?” 

The mission is Iruka’s first outside of the village for almost ten months. Academy teachers are required to take at least two C-ranks or higher a year, but Iruka’s injury and involvement in the chuunin exam swayed the requirements. Even before that, the missions weren’t much more than couriering during the academy’s breaks.

This one is interesting enough that it makes Iruka realize he misses fieldwork. It also makes him realize that he never wants to go back to it full-time. He enjoys the challenges in the field. He enjoys working with a team of adults, even when it means taking someone else’s orders. He enjoys creative problem solving, and hell, he even enjoys the physical exertion to a degree. He’s never been a slouch. 

But none of those things are worth enough to leave his children. There are challenges in keeping thirty eight-year-olds with knives from amputating their own appendages. He loves the moment of comprehension in a child’s eyes, even when it means he has to explain something ten different ways. It’s creative problem solving when he finds new ways to keep them engaged in his lessons, and there’s nothing quite so exerting as chasing Naruto or Konohamaru over three-quarters of Konoha and carrying them bodily back to the school. 

He loves teaching. 

Iruka genuinely relishes the experience of working with Genma’s team, though, and he turns out to be of more use than he thought he would. Breaking the seals without setting them off requires either setting larger seals around them to contain the effects, or disrupting the flow to symbols in a particular order to avoid destabilizing the wrong piece at the wrong time. 

He starts to feel good about being there when the Inuzuka suggests erasing the sigil for ‘air’ first, and the Hyuuga agrees. Iruka snaps a hand out to stop the young chuunin from reaching forward, luckily just in time. He tries to explain in the least patronizing tone possible that doing that would cause the chakra lines from the ‘earth’ and ‘lightning’ kana to meet at the tri-legged seal surrounding ‘vortex’. 

The Inuzuka stares blankly, the Hyuuga narrows his eyes, and Genma’s senbon flips to the other side of his mouth. Iruka takes a deep breath for patience. These absolute basics are covered in the academy, for goodness’ sake, and while children are ignorant for good reason, adults have no excuse. Politely, he informs them that the resulting explosion from the instability of two natures on an odd-numbered seal would be far worse than actually setting off the trap. 

Genma grins, they follow Iruka advice (leading to no harm for any of them), and at the next trap, they wait for Iruka’s suggestion first. From the pleased expression on Genma’s face, Iruka thinks he knows all the answers himself. Maybe it’s a test, maybe the tokubetsu just finds Iruka’s pained explanations amusing. As long as he doesn’t let the other two blow themselves or others up while Iruka’s busy with a different seal, he supposes he can live with the irritating, satisfied looks.

It’s nice to be listened to by people of his own rank and higher, for once. But it’s not the same, and when they finish, Iruka’s glad to get back to his own apartment and shower off the mud that’s caked into his pants from kneeling on the ground. 

The shower gives Iruka time to process all of the stray thoughts that crept up on him during the afternoon and sunk their teeth into his flesh, waiting for the dust to settle before injecting their venom. Now, with the hot water running over him, rage somewhat abated, and body worn, it’s embarrassment that leaps to the forefront.

Iruka healed his ANBU the first time they met, clumsily and ineffectually. He healed Kakashi, too. He stared when Iruka suggested it, oddly uncertain in his response. Perhaps Kakashi was worried Iruka would recognize him, or else he was dreading the same ineptitude Iruka had shown as a genin. That is the starting thought for Iruka’s descent into mortification. Then comes the sheer _volume_ of information Kakashi has about Iruka. By now, Iruka can’t remember half the things he told his ANBU, but definitely enough to regret it. Details about his pranks (and fucking hell, that was how Kakashi knew so much about his youthful indiscretions) were the least of his worries. 

He told his ANBU about Mizuki, talked about his ‘friend’ regularly throughout the years. That was how Kakashi knew Iruka would blame himself. He probably saw the warning signs long before Iruka consciously gave them heed. Iruka talked about missions that went wrong (never classified information, of course), and might have even told Inu when he had his first kiss. At least he knows he wouldn’t have mentioned that it was an awkward bumping of noses and teeth with Izumo. He wasn’t confident enough in his interest in men back then to broadcast it, even to his ANBU. That’s a very small mercy. 

Next in the queue are his memories of the many tears that filled that space over the years. Iruka cried in front of the memorial stone for hours, sometimes an entire night, in the months following his parent’s deaths. Kakashi witnessed at least some of that, saw Iruka sleeping in the cold and gave him a blanket sprinkled with fur and the scents of dust and soy sauce. Iruka knows that grief isn’t something to be ashamed about. He’s never believed that it’s a weakness, regardless of anything the Shinobi Code sets forth, and that belief largely stems from the Sandaime himself. He just hid his tears as a kid because he wanted to make others smile, to stop looking at him with that detestable mix of disregard and sympathy. 

Nowadays, he hides his tears because he has people who rely on him. That gives him more strength than he’s ever had before.

The one mercy is that Kakashi stopped coming to the memorial stone before Iruka actually met him as the Copy-nin. Iruka would be stewing in mortification for years to come if he had spoken to the man about himself. He probably wouldn’t have been able to hide his deeper interest, either, and Iruka would rather tell that to Kakashi in person. 

Maybe. 

It isn’t until he’s laying in bed, hair loose and damp around his shoulders, when Iruka realizes that the importance of Kakashi’s identity goes far beyond embarrassment or anger, rightful or not. Beyond what Kakashi thinks of him, even, and whatever reasons kept him from the memorial stone and Iruka himself. 

The realization of what it truly means is both simple and terrifying. 

There are many important people in Iruka’s life. Naruto shines as the star, too dumb and earnest not to fill Iruka’s heart. Anko, Izumo, and Kotetsu are important as well, his friends through and through. There’s also Konohamaru and the rest of his students, the precious future of Konoha, who Iruka would die for without an ounce of hesitation. The Sandaime and Iruka’s parents are gone, but they live in his memory. They always will.

But there’s one person to which Iruka has given so much of himself. One person who he’s trusted with his vulnerabilities, who he’s waited for and wished for and relied on more than anyone else. 

And there’s another who Iruka hasn’t given as much, who he hasn’t gotten the chance to come to love, but who holds many of Iruka’s hopes and desires, ones that extend more than a few tomorrows. So many that his opinion and motivations regarding Iruka matter more than they safely should. 

Now, Iruka knows, the two people are one and the same. 

To think that one person… Hatake Kakashi... holds so much power over Iruka, so much of his soul, is abjectly terrifying. 

It’s also thrilling. 

If Kakashi betrays him, through pity or deceit, it will be more devastating than Mizuki, who Iruka loved but had always known showed him no devotion in return. Kakashi’s betrayal will be one of Iruka’s past, present, and future.

If Kakashi accepts him, trusts him, _cares_ for him the way he claimed as Inu, it could be greater than Iruka’s best, most cherished dreams. Everything he wants, everything he’s yearned for, in one man; a man who already knows who he is and holds affection for him despite. A companion. A partner for all the moments Iruka wants to share.

He could end it now. 

Save himself the pain when it all comes crashing down. 

That thought lasts about a moment before Iruka’s choking on a laugh, pressing the back of his arm over his eyes so hard he sees spots and feels moisture soak into his sleeve. 

No. He really can’t. When has Iruka run away from _anything_? When has he ever given up on what he truly wants? Even when it bites him in the ass, stabs him in the back with a fuma shuriken, Iruka can’t let something go. Not when there’s hope, however foolish. 

There’s more to consider, like whether he’ll tell Kakashi he knows Inu’s identity. What he could possibly say to Naruto if they actually did get together, because that is certain to be a disaster. Whether he can live with it if Kakashi wants parts of Iruka, but not the whole. 

What he’ll do if Kakashi doesn’t wake up at all. 

Those worries can wait until tomorrow. He falls asleep knowing that, whatever Kakashi wants to give him, Iruka will accept with an open heart. 

He doesn’t know how to do anything else. 

Over the next four weeks, Inu and Kakashi slowly assimilate into one person in Iruka’s mind, fractured instances and phrases forming a collage that steadily brings him closer to the real picture. 

He’s sorting through scrolls in a partially destroyed building when he connects how Inu and Kakashi both tilt their heads to the side like curious dogs. 

Tea is steeping in Konohamaru’s kitchen when Iruka combines Kakashi saying he’d “heard” that Iruka and Naruto were close, with all the times Iruka talked about his favorite student at the memorial stone.

Flipping his pillow to the cooler side makes him remember the tanzaku’s disappearance, and he wonders if Kakashi still has it somewhere, or if he discarded it offhand. 

Filling out a report for a successful dead drop reminds him of Kakashi’s suggestion of Ichiraku’s, and how he might have chosen it because of Iruka’s preferences rather than the convenient location. 

The shaky high from survive a fight for life is still coursing through his bloodstream when he decides he isn’t going to tell Kakashi. Not explicitly and immediately, at least. He’ll push and prod and do the best he can to show Kakashi that he _wants_ to know, that he will accept any inch of himself that Kakashi is willing to give. But just because Iruka is ready to jump into this like a cannonball, to submerse himself from head to toe in Kakashi’s waves, doesn’t mean he can force the other man to be. 

He’s sitting at Kakashi’s bedside when he wonders if he’ll ever get a chance to know either way. 

A mission report falls from his hands when he hears that Naruto has returned. 

Hope swims in his ears when he learns that their new Hokage is Tsunade, one of the most famed medic-nin the world has ever seen. 

He beams like the sun when Naruto tells him they’re awake.

Lunch with Naruto is comforting both in familiarity and the opportunity to convince himself, with his own eyes, that Naruto really is back safe and sound. But that one hour together is the only respite they have before Iruka has to meet another team at the gates, no opportunity to even drop by the hospital on his way. 

He’s stepped through Konoha’s barrier more times in the last month than in the last five years combined. This is the first time he’s felt as though he’s leaving something important behind. 

Six days later, Iruka returns to the village. He’s tired but whole. It’s Izumo and Kotetsu who tell him that Sasuke has defected and many of Iruka’s former students hospitalized by Orochimaru’s henchmen in the process. It was touch and go for a few of them, but last Izumo and Kotetsu heard, they would all live. They had no idea if Kakashi had been involved or to what extent. 

After the initial burst of fear for the lives of his genin begins to recede, in steps the expected guilt. Bone-shaking guilt that makes Iruka feel the world through a numb mesh. For once, after the last excruciating month, the images flicking through his mind aren’t those of silver hair or masks, but of a child; sullen and small and stony-faced no matter how many times Iruka tried to open him up. A child who lost everything, and the most Iruka could do for him was to ask the Sandaime to assign a counselor. So, nothing at all. 

Unlike with Mizuki, Iruka didn’t see this coming. He truly didn’t. Sasuke had demons, of course, and a tendency to view others as baggage rather than comrades—but he was so young, had so much opportunity for change just laid out before him. He and Naruto were building a friendship, even if it was on competitive streaks a mile wide. 

That thought jars Iruka, unsticks his feet from the ground and carries him to the hospital before he can even put down his pack. 

After Mizuki’s attack, Iruka was left without focus. He had simple routines to fall back on: teaching, friends, the memorial stone; but no clear direction. Naruto was old enough not to need a parent, so the best Iruka could be was a… kind of older brother. There when he was needed, but most of the time, he wasn’t. So his guilt consumed him, filled in the empty spaces in his thoughts, oil seeping into his porous mind. 

This time, there are three people that Iruka knows are suffering more than him. There’s no place for self-loathing and regrets. Not when the rest of Team Seven, people Iruka cherishes, are struggling. 

The first one he finds is Sakura. She’s clearly headed for the hospital as well, bags under her eyes and a weariness to her step that makes her look five years older. But when he greets her, she smiles and raises her hand in a wave. 

The surprise shows on her face when he asks her to come with him to buy gifts for the hospitalized genin, which makes Iruka feel worse for not keeping up with her as well as he should have since her graduation. Perhaps she isn’t as alone as many of the others, her parents checking the boxes of both living and supportive, but Iruka knows she struggles. He probes gently as they walk and shop, aware that her personality doesn’t respond well to being pushed. They skirt the topic of Sasuke, addressing the status of each of her other team members first. 

Sakura surprises him when the discussion turns to herself. 

“I ordered all the books Tsunade-sama recommended, but they won’t come in until next week. Can you believe the Konoha library doesn’t have ‘Pathways and Arteries: The Relationship of Chakra and Blood’?” She’s complaining loudly, but there’s a thread of excitement in her expressive features. It’s deep, buried beneath layers of fatigue and a sober determination that Iruka hasn’t seen in her since the chuunin exam. But it’s there, and it soothes some of his worries. 

He tells her that, with her brains, he has no doubt she can exceed any of the Hokage’s expectations. She blushes and gives him a shy smile as she ducks her head, pleased with the praise. She’s always been eager for approval. Iruka is glad he has reason to give it.

She isn’t happy. He’s sure Sasuke’s betrayal affects her far more than she’s letting on. But she has a purpose, and a new teacher now, who can help her explore her strengths in a way he never could. 

Iruka is no longer needed. 

Naruto is sitting up in the hospital bed when Iruka arrives, shoving the bandages up his nose to scratch underneath them. He brightens the second Iruka enters, grin slipping into place in an exaggerated charade that Iruka remembers donning himself. There’s an edge to that smile. It hangs on rusted hinges, too brittle for stability. 

It’s a show of Naruto’s reserve that he asks about Iruka’s mission rather than immediately leaping into a tale of his own. Eventually, they get there. Naruto tells Iruka about the Earth jutsu they were trapped under, how Choji got them out of it, the weird guy that used spider webs, the crazy shinobi who used his own bones as weapons. When they come to the conclusion, Naruto doesn’t talk about his fight with Sasuke. He sits for a few moments, lips constricted and quiet in a way that Naruto never should be. Iruka starts to reach out, to offer him some of the comfort he should have years ago—

Naruto raises his head, and his smile isn’t rusted anymore. It’s been scraped clean, sandpapered with a grit to match Sakura’s, sharp and resolute. He tells Iruka about training with Jiraiya, how it may take a few years but don’t worry, he’ll write (Iruka doesn’t expect that to last long), and how he’s going to find Sasuke when he’s strong enough. He’ll bring Sasuke back to Konoha, no matter what it takes.

Pride sticks thickly in Iruka’s throat. He messes up Naruto’s hair, making the boy groan and swat at Iruka’s hand. 

It makes him feel a little old, a little left in the dust, to learn that neither of his students need him these days. He doesn’t look forward to Naruto leaving, when he’ll have nothing but an empty apartment and a single occupied seat at Ichiraku’s. He’s going to worry about Naruto, and he’ll miss watching Naruto’s progress, because he’s growing more every single day. 

But mostly, he’s privileged to see the strong shinobi they have become. 

The last member of Team Seven isn’t in Konoha. It may take a while before either of them have enough downtime for an actual discussion, but Iruka vows that he won’t rest until they do. Whether Kakashi feels an ounce of attraction for Iruka or not, regardless of the reasons he stopped going to the memorial stone—Iruka remembers the seed of hope that Kakashi’s words planted in him. This time, it’s his turn. 

He’s not going to let Kakashi suffer alone.


	13. Chapter 13

The list of returning shinobi receives more of Iruka’s attention than ever before. It stares at him in frustrating, blank mockery each time he searches for Hatake Kakashi. Which, admittedly, is relatively rare now that he works at the desk less than part-time. Between their respective missions, it takes several weeks for their paths to collide. When they do, it’s purely by accident. 

Skipping a step, Iruka turns a full three-sixty to follow a flash of silver hair as it crosses under a flickering street lamp. There’s no time for misgivings or second-thoughts as Iruka draws close. Taking a deep breath to braid the loose threads of his resolve into a stubborn rope, he makes an effort to plaster a welcoming expression over his raw determination. “Kakashi-sensei!” 

Kakashi is a machine whose gears have been blocked, freezing mid-step almost comically, and raising his head with an exaggerated look of surprise. Well, exaggerated compared to his usual laconic nature. His attention flickers over Iruka’s body, sluggishly returning to his face a good two seconds later. Then his mask expands over his cheeks, eye creasing in a smile. 

“Iruka-sensei.” He speaks each syllable as a distinct, pleased sound, lingering over them like honey. It would likely make Iruka blush like a genin if not for his preoccupation with the weird way Kakashi still has a foot raised from the ground. He lowers it slowly, as if retaining his balance requires some effort. “What can I do for you?”

Iruka wonders for the first time if Kakashi drinks alcohol. Rubbing at his scar, Iruka quickly decides he isn’t going to let Kakashi off even if the man is five shots under. This is too important an opportunity to waste. “Uh. Well, I was just wondering if you’d had dinner yet?”

A slow blink before Kakashi looks up at the darkening sky. “No.”

Iruka waits for the continuation, but nothing comes. “Then…” Kakashi tilts his head in what appears to be genuine bemusement. It shakes the remaining dregs of Iruka’s confidence, making his next words come out trailing and uncertain. “Would you like to have dinner with me, Kakashi-sensei? We never did get a chance, after the chuunin exams…”

“Oh.” Comprehension dawns only to be replaced by a furrowed brow. Then silence. 

Iruka’s smile, well-practiced from interactions with irascible parents, drips from his face. His gaze drops as the quiet swells, stomach clenching. Out of all his fears, Kakashi rejecting even the simple offer for dinner wasn’t one of them. He’d thought that was the single way they were on the same page, the one thing he could absolutely count on, considering Kakashi’s request for a rain check before absconding Sasuke for training. Iruka didn’t consider that he wouldn’t even get this.

Then Kakashi’s answer comes, dancing lightly in the space between them, as if his hesitation never was. “Have anywhere in mind?” 

One of these days, Iruka is going to have to build up an immunity to the mercurial force that is Hatake Kakashi rather than let himself get whipped around by every perceived reaction. Hopefully, he’ll get that chance. For now, Iruka lets relief crash through and carry him forward. 

This is the part he knows by rote. He hasn’t planned the exact words, because he doesn’t want to come across as rehearsed or ingenuine. But the sentiment of them and where the discussion will take place, he decided long ago. “Have you ever been to Onishi’s?” Kakashi shakes his head as Iruka leads them down a side street. “It used to be a civilian bar, but a retired shinobi took it over last year. It’s pretty quiet these days.”

“I didn’t know you ate anywhere other than Ichiraku, sensei.” Kakashi comments mildly.

“I do.” Iruka tries not to sound too embarrassed. “Ramen is just cheap and quick. But I have been known to eat a vegetable or two on occasion, unlike a certain student of ours.” 

Kakashi doesn’t respond, and when Iruka glances at him from his periphery, he sees a new tightness in the corners of Kakashi’s eye. He no longer seems drunk, but his reactions are still too visceral, too obvious to be entirely normal. And it might be his imagination, but the jounin seems to be walking stiffly, the roll of his hips more... shuffling than ambling. 

After the mention of Naruto, it’s easy to see that he’s not off-base concerning Kakashi’s lingering guilt, but it doesn’t feel like a victory, and he’s not eager to ask Kakashi why he’s acting even more strangely than normal. Iruka casts around for an easy topic. “I hadn’t heard you were back from your last mission.”

Kakashi glances to Iruka with something like surprise. “Do you normally hear when I come back from missions?” 

Iruka reddens and turns away, scratching his nose. “The guards manning the gate normally drop off the list of returning shinobi while I’m still at the mission desk, so Hokage-sama can look at it in the morning. I skim the names, sometimes. I wasn’t working last night, though.” 

“You normally work Tuesdays.” 

Iruka is certain he started at the mission desk after Inu’s disappearance, but he supposes Kakashi must have learned it through the years of turning in reports. 

Solely to Iruka. 

Well. Perhaps Iruka’s been a bit of an idiot the last few years. 

“I do. But the Academy’s been closed down since the attack, so the teachers are rotating between the desk and missions. I’m leaving again Friday.” 

“Long mission?” 

“A couple weeks.” Iruka holds the door open as he turns into the restaurant, Kakashi following behind him. 

Onishi’s is all dark wood and low lighting, high partitions between the booths that give an added feel of privacy without obstructing line of sight to the door. It’s reasonably priced and the food is decent, but the inhospitable service and frequent shinobi customers tend to drive the civilians of Konoha to other establishments. They also have decent tea; nothing exotic, but brewed well enough. It seems like neutral ground to put Kakashi at ease, since Iruka’s goal of the evening isn’t to push boundaries. Not too far, at least.

Leading them to a booth in the far corner, a good distance from the few chuunin who occupy the place, Iruka takes the seat with his back to the door. When Kakashi sits, his movements are a hair more awkward than his normal graceful prowl, and Iruka spots a strip of white between his glove and sleeve. A brace. 

“You’re injured.” He accuses with a frown.

“It’s nothing. Sprained wrist.” Kakashi dismisses, moving his hand under the table as if that will make Iruka forget what he’s seen.

“Why didn’t they heal it at the hospital?”

“They don’t like to heal too much at once.” Kakashi says. His eye widens and darts away.

“Too much?” Iruka is extremely familiar with that policy. Unease settles deep, scraping at his tendons. He would have never known Kakashi was hospitalized, if not for this random encounter. It stings more than it ought to. “What else was injured?”

“Maa…” Kakashi starts weakly. The forefinger of his other hand taps a few times on the surface of the table. 

It’s not shinobi shorthand, but it isn’t far from it. Iruka opens his mouth, questions he shouldn’t ask on the tip of his tongue. He’s interrupted by two laminated menus being slapped down in front of them. 

“I’m out of pork.” Kaede, the vibrantly orange-haired matron, is short enough that her inhospitable scowl is nearly level with Iruka’s even though he’s sitting. Her wrinkled lips press together in an irritated gash. “What to drink?” 

“Good evening, Kaede-san. Hojicha?” Iruka suggests, looking to Kakashi for confirmation. Kaede turns the second he gives it. 

Leaning forward to peer at his companion, Iruka searches for any other evident sign of injury. He’s been worrying about his precious people for three months straight. He’s not about to let this go when one of them is finally here in front of him. “They let you out of the hospital before healing you fully?”

“I’m here, aren’t I?” Kakashi quips. Before Iruka can object, his tone drops to something serious. He doesn’t meet Iruka’s eye, watching his own thumb as it traces the grains in the table. “Really, sensei, I’m fine. I’m not going to be irresponsible with my health and deprive Konoha one of her best shinobi in this uneasy time.” 

_What about depriving_ me _of_ you _?_

Iruka doesn’t like the way Kakashi speaks as if his skill as a weapon is his only merit. Shinobi are tools, Iruka knows this—but that doesn’t have to be _all_ they are. It’s certainly not all Kakashi is. Not to him. 

But now isn’t the time to say that. That’s not what this night is about, Iruka has made a promise to himself of that. If he pushes in that direction now, he’s likely to find himself sitting alone before he can say his piece. So Iruka nods, reluctantly, and sits back in the booth. He stares at his menu without seeing.

In a few minutes, Kaede is back with their tea, a glare serving as their cue to order. She leaves and takes the only convenient place to stare with her.

The silence is pregnant, filled with all of the things Iruka wants to say. Kakashi seems to have the opposite problem. His eye remains fixed on the table until Iruka speaks.

“You were right.” He says abruptly. Kakashi raises an eyebrow. “They were ready, for the chuunin exam. What happened with Orochimaru… you couldn’t have anticipated that.” 

It’s an instant change. Kakashi’s hands retract to his lap. His voice and demeanor shift, taut as a whip, eye narrowing sharply. “How much do you know?” 

A few months ago, Iruka would have withdrawn, flushing in either anger at the tone or doubt at his own right to bring up such a personal subject. Now, Iruka answers honestly. “The basics. Naruto filled me in on anything I hadn’t already guessed.” 

“Then you know I spent a month with Sasuke before the final exam. Thirty days, every second with him, after Orochimaru’s first attack.” The Kakashi before him now is eerily similar to the one during the chuunin exam; cutting with deadly precision. “And I didn’t see this coming.” 

Iruka’s stomach bubbles and warning surges through his system, but he can no longer step back as he did at the exam. His perception has changed. He sees the course of Kakashi’s disdain, knows it’s self-directed. Now, he wants to move forward, to step between Kakashi and the blade he tries to hold to himself. Kakashi may be a dangerous predator, but Iruka isn’t his prey. Leaning his forearms on the table, Iruka laces his fingers to keep from reaching out.

“I taught him for years.” Iruka is almost surprised by his own composure. “I never once thought he would betray the village.” 

“You had almost thirty students. I had three.” 

Kakashi’s glare and expression are unyielding. He’s a mountain face and Iruka’s a trickle of water, in search of a crack that will lead to fertile ground. It’ll take years for him to erode a channel through sheer willpower. 

But Iruka has had ten years already, and there’s one thing that he has learned in that time:

If nothing else... Kakashi will always listen. 

Expelling his frustration in a heavy breath, Iruka prepares to scrub open his own wounds, expose them to Kakashi in the hopes of reaching something in return. He can’t change what Kakashi chooses to give, but he can show how much he himself is willing to receive. 

He speaks softly, calmly as he can.

“I tried to talk to him. After the massacre. I sat with him for an hour every day, after school, for weeks. But he never said a word, no matter what I did. He’d answer questions in class, or respond to the other students occasionally—normally Naruto. But after school… nothing.” Just a blank slate and hard, dark eyes. “I begged the Sandaime to get him some help. I know he tried to talk to Sasuke himself, at least a few times, called in a psychologist, but… nothing worked. Eventually, we gave up. I convinced myself that Sasuke would be fine, that he was internalizing it and dealing with it in his own way. I was stupid, only seventeen, just starting as a teacher. I was optimistic, naive. But I really believed it.” 

Iruka spreads his fingers on the table, anchoring himself emotionally and physically. He holds Kakashi’s gaze, steadfast and swallowing down the tumultuous churning in his gut, the way his throat threatens to convulse around the name that leaves it. “You told me that Mizuki made his own choice. That he could have asked for my help. The same is true of Sasuke.”

There’s a slight hesitation, a split-second of thought before Kakashi responds. Although his icy exterior hasn’t changed, that momentary flicker gives Iruka a sliver of hope. 

“This is different.” 

“No, it isn’t. Sasuke isn’t a child. Not anymore.” Iruka’s lips press in a firm line and his hands curl into fists. It’s a difficult admission—not because Iruka doesn’t believe it, but because he wishes more than anything that he could go back five years and fix it all. Fix everything. Fix Mizuki, fix Inu, save the Sandaime. Iruka had the opportunity to help Sasuke when he was a pre-genin, when he was still injured and bleeding from the massacre of his clan. Now, those wounds have sealed in particles of hatred and revenge, leaving irrevocable scars. Maybe Iruka could have helped him back them, cleaned out the wounds when they were fresh and weeping. 

Nothing can help Sasuke now, no matter how much Naruto wishes it was true. Nothing except for himself. Naruto may someday become the catalyst, but Sasuke has to wield the blade. 

“He was when I had him, and I thought he still was. But I was wrong. _You_ proved that. They _were_ ready for the exam. And if Sasuke was ready to fight the enemy, to put his life on the line to protect others, to step in front of Naruto in the Land of Waves and take an attack he thought would kill him—if he was ready to die to save his friend, then he understood loyalty. And that means he understood what it meant to leave, to betray his village. He made his choice.”

Kakashi’s eye travels over Iruka’s face, indecipherable. Iruka suddenly realizes that his voice steadily climbed with his emotion, that his face is hot and his teeth gritted. He flushes and leans back, chewing on his lip in chagrin, at both his lack of self-control and the intensity with which Kakashi regards him. 

He keeps his head down as their food is placed before them, pouring tea for both of them in silence. Kakashi’s stare doesn’t leave him the entire time. He can feel it as clearly as Inu’s fingers against his collarbone.

There’s nothing more Iruka can think of to say.

Though he refuses to broach Kakashi’s privacy by looking up, Iruka watches the food steadily disappear from Kakashi’s plate, chopsticks catching and disappearing with bites faster than Iruka can even close his own. The chopsticks pause every so often, perhaps Kakashi replacing his mask, or else trying to time it where they finish the meal at the same time.

He knows Kakashi must be considering his words, at least to a degree, if he isn’t he hasn’t up and left. Iruka doesn’t want to ruin that by pushing too far. But he also doesn’t want to end tonight not knowing where they stand. 

He’s often felt uncomfortable around the jounin. Perhaps it’s the severity hidden behind lackadaisical charm, or maybe Iruka has always had a subconscious inkling of the truth. Maybe it’s just physical attraction, plain and simple. 

But there’s one thing he knows he’s comfortable doing with Kakashi, even if he hadn’t known who it was at the time. 

“Two of my students tried to cheat in their weapons practical. Just before the Academy closed.” Iruka says, dipping a piece of pork in a thick, fragrant sauce. He lifts his gaze to find Kakashi watching him coolly, mask perfectly in place. Quickly looking back down at his food, Iruka continues, since it seems Kakashi isn’t going to cut him off. The story comes out haltingly at first, not as easy to tell when the person in question is Kakashi rather than a faceless ANBU. A thick dollop falls from his meat. “Konohamaru transformed himself into a kunai for his classmate to use. He thought he’d be able to correct his trajectory mid-flight to get her a bullseye.” 

Kakashi lifts his tea, Iruka can see in his periphery, swirling the amber liquid rather than drinking. “Oh?” He asks, barely a question, but sounding vaguely amused. 

It’s enough to lighten the gravity of the atmosphere, to spurn Iruka to keep going. “Of course, there were a few flaws with his amazing plan. The first one being that I noticed when one of my students suddenly disappeared. The second being that he didn’t account for the rigid nature of, well, a kunai, and the lack of purchase when sailing through the air. And third, he didn’t think about the fact that a kunai, hitting correctly, embeds itself into the target. Which isn’t as much fun for a living person.” 

Kakashi lets out a low huff of air, something that might be the very beginning of a laugh. Iruka’s lips quirk into a smile and, as soon as he finishes that tale, he launches into a lengthy explanation of the multiple escape attempts he’s had to foil as an academy teacher. 

At first Kakashi is almost nonverbal, but by the time Iruka starts delving into his own time as a prankster, he’s managed to draw a full-blown chuckle from the man. It’s incredibly satisfying, warming Iruka’s cheeks and chest with a thrumming desire to draw out more. Ten years of talking, almost exactly like this, yet Iruka has never before heard Kakashi respond, let alone laugh. It’s intoxicating. Addicting. 

It’ll probably be a frequent feature of his fantasies from here on. The thought doesn’t unnerve Iruka as much as it should.

By the time they finish eating, Iruka has grown confident in his stories, and he’s stretching out the last of his tea in the hope it’ll make the evening last longer. 

“Doesn’t sound like they’re quite at your level yet, sensei.” Kakashi hums pleasantly. There’s a softness to his half-lidded gaze. Something very easy to interpret as affection. Iruka’s having trouble breathing. 

Maybe the lack of appropriate oxygen to his brain is what makes him seize the opportunity before he can think better of it. “How do you know so much about my prankster days, Kakashi-sensei?” He asks, narrowing his eyes in playful suspicion. 

He promised himself he wouldn’t press, but there’s a pleasant buzz in the space between them, Kakashi’s laugh echoing in his ears, and he wants _more_. He’s greedy. He can almost convince himself, looking at the relaxed slump to Kakashi’s shoulders, the lukewarm remnants of their tea that neither of them have drank, the warmth in his voice, that Kakashi will tell him if Iruka just… hints. A little. “That’s the second time you’ve mentioned it, but we weren’t in the Academy together.”

“Maa,” Kakashi’s eye creases, teasing in his tone, and it helps to dampen a bit of the disappointment that falls when he realizes Kakashi is just going to deflect. “You give yourself too little credit, sensei. Everyone knew the infamous Umino Iruka. Besides, I don’t think there was a soul alive in Konoha who didn’t hear Anko’s murderous rampage after you made her think Kotetsu had burned down the dango shop.” 

“I’m still surprised that worked.” Iruka grins. That must have been when he was around twelve… a good two years or so before he met Inu at the memorial. Maybe that’s a frame of reference for when Kakashi started watching him. Or maybe Iruka really does underestimate his reign of terror on Konoha. “I actually had Izumo’s help with that one, since I’m terrible with genjutsu. He’s still terrified of snakes.”

Kaede slips a receipt between them on her way to another table. Iruka half-hopes Kakashi will ignore it, let this night continue a bit longer, but he sets down his teacup. He starts to withdraw, no doubt reaching for his wallet to pay his half of the bill. 

Iruka reaches forward on instinct, resting his fingers on the bare skin of Kakashi’s uninjured wrist. 

Well, _inspired_ by instinct. No one actually touches a shinobi, let alone a jounin, without considering it first; at least no one with a decent sense of self-preservation. Iruka is conscious of this and keeps his touch light, unrestricting. The back of Kakashi’s wrist is dry and cold, delicate despite the power of which Iruka knows it’s capable. He can feel Kakashi’s chakra just beneath the surface, an electric hum that tingles Iruka’s skin and flutters in his ribs. 

He half-expects Kakashi to jerk away, or at least ask a question, but when Iruka darts a glance up, Kakashi is entirely fixated on the spot where they connect, gray eye dark. Iruka pulls back—slowly. The pads of his fingers remain connected to Kakashi, skimming the raised cuff of his glove, the cool metal and engraved Konoha leaf of the guard. Traversing smooth leather over Kakashi’s knuckles, brushing bare skin again as he reaches smooth, blunt fingernails... and departs. 

Kakashi never looks away.

It isn’t until their connection is entirely severed, Iruka’s palm flat on the polished surface of the table, that Kakashi seems to connect back to reality. His stare jerks up to meet Iruka’s, intent and searching. 

Iruka’s entire body is warm, his skin too tight. He wants to strip Kakashi’s glove and memorize every crevice of his palm, the fine lines and long-worn calluses, to bring the man’s hand to his face and feel it press against the heated surface of his cheek.

Now, in the low lighting, it’s easy to believe Kakashi would want that, too.

Shivering, Iruka drops his head. Clearing his throat in a desperate bid for stability, he fumbles for his wallet. “I got it.” He manages to keep firm footing as he stands, pulling out a few bills to cover the expense. “You paid for me last time.” He adds lamely, taking longer than necessary to situate the wallet back in his pocket so that his hands are occupied with something other than Kakashi.

“Thank you, sensei.” The jounin murmurs. 

Iruka gives a jerky nod and turns towards the door, eager to escape the suddenly stifling room. Fall air feels cool against his cheeks, and he takes a grateful breath of it, letting it clear the steam from his lungs. 

In his (what now seems like woefully inadequate) planning, Iruka didn’t really account for how tonight would end. He would love to interpret Kakashi’s acceptance of his touch as a sign of attraction, and he might convince himself of that when he thinks over this dinner again and again throughout the coming days. But this isn’t the time to make further advances, to suss out whether Kakashi actually thinks of this as a date or just a return of a favor. 

That can wait. Iruka can be patient.

As long as Kakashi doesn’t require ten more years of said patience. 

“Thank you for having dinner with me, Kakashi-sensei.” Iruka says, shifting his weight and rubbing at his scar awkwardly. 

“Just Kakashi, please.”

That… seems like a good sign. Iruka nods absently, warring with himself. 

_Oh, fuck it._

“I’d like to do this again, Kakashi.” He raises his gaze to meet Kakashi’s. A hesitant smile quirks his lips. “Perhaps without such a serious topic, next time.” 

For a moment, Kakashi just watches him, impassive, and Iruka waits. He _thinks_ he knows Kakashi’s answer, _hopes_ he does. But the relief is still immense when Kakashi breathes his response. “Yeah. That sounds nice, Iruka-sensei.” 

“Just Iruka.” He beams, delighted grin stretching his mouth. As he turns, he sees Kakashi’s gaze drop to his lips. Iruka’s heart pounds, eager and ardent, and he decides this is all the promise he needs. “I’ll see you, then. Goodnight, Kakashi.” 

As Iruka puts together his mission pack that night, adding ration bars and a fresh pot of ink to his supplies, he allows a single thread of hope linger in his mind. He still goes to the memorial stone before each mission, to say goodbye to his parents and ask for their blessing. 

This time, he thinks, just maybe… he’ll have someone living to see him off, as well.

His team is due to depart from the gates not long after sunrise, to make the most of the first day of travel on their way to Iron Country. Orange streaks the blue sky by the time he arrives at the memorial, the thickness of his flak jacket warding off any lingering early-morning chill. His pack rests heavy on his shoulder, a weight he has become re-accustomed to over the last months of missions. 

He says a quick greeting and prayer to his parents, then closes his eyes and allows chakra to well beneath his skin.

He’s prepared for disappointment, almost expects it. But that unnurtured glimmer of promise grows into a raging bonfire when lightning dances in the trees. 

Their tree. 

Iruka barely makes a conscious decision before he’s there, standing on the branch a few feet from Kakashi. 

No. _Inu_ , Iruka is forcefully reminded. The mask is in place, red-rimmed sockets looking back at him, but there’s a single major difference. Rather than the traditional ANBU uniform, Kakashi is wearing a long white cloak, the type that Iruka has only caught sight of once before. It designates unit leaders, the absolute elite even within ANBU’s ranks. 

He doesn’t know what that means, if Kakashi is transformed into what he thinks is a more effective ANBU disguise, or if he’s truly been recalled. Iruka doesn’t have to know, not right now. “Inu-san.” A smile slowly spreads across his lips. He’s already decided how to do this, decided to give Kakashi time to tell Iruka of his own volition—but he can’t quite help the hint he gives next, the under threaded plea for honesty. He promised himself he wouldn’t push; not that he wouldn’t gently prod. “I guess you heard about my mission.” 

Stepping closer, Iruka focuses on Kakashi’s gray eye, the one he knows is there, concealed by ninjutsu. When Kakashi, as expected, ignores Iruka’s clue that he wants to know who Inu is, he pushes that aside and focuses. 

“We don’t have much time. But I… I want to know something.” His tongue darts out to moisten dry lips as he takes another step, bringing them nearly as close as their meeting before, positions reversed. Kakashi’s back rests against the tree, allowing Iruka to control the space between them.

There is one question that rises above all the others. One that is the source of nearly all of Iruka’s lingering uncertainty. 

“Why did you stop coming here?” 

Kakashi has been immobile this entire time, allowing Iruka to act while offering no response himself. Now, there’s a slight twitch to his head, a tilt of his chin that indicates a reaction, but he says nothing. Not that Iruka truly expected him to speak, but…

“Was it because of me?” Iruka’s whisper is too fragile, too hoarse, betraying the emotion that rides on this question. 

But he won’t take it back. 

Three heartbeats of silence. Then, Kakashi slowly shakes his head. 

The tension dissolves. Iruka lets out the breath he was holding. He opens his mouth to speak. Closes it. 

He wants to hear Kakashi’s voice, but this will have to do. He reaches out, unhurriedly, giving the other time to move away if he needs. Just as in the restaurant, Kakashi doesn’t. His mask tips down a fraction, watching Iruka’s hand as his fingers slide through the divide of the white cloak. 

He gently pulls the fabric aside with the back of his hand, baring the ANBU uniform beneath. Armored vest, black undershirt, mask that conceals Kakashi’s throat and, Iruka knows, half of his face. His arms, covered by braces but free of the sleeves of the cloak, are held ramrod straight at his sides with the strange, alert posture that Inu always seems to have and Kakashi actively rejects. 

Iruka wonders which is closer to his natural state. 

Probably this one. 

He doesn’t go for Kakashi’s hand, not at first. Kakashi’s fingers are curved into his thigh, showing restraint that Iruka wants to dispel. Tanned fingers fall on the exposed skin of Kakashi’s shoulder, unmarred flesh that he knows is marked by a curling red tattoo on the other side. 

Slowly, he trails down Kakashi’s arm, white wraps, the coarse fabric of his brace, the smooth leather of his glove. There’s no bare skin here, so Iruka comes to stop on Kakashi’s wrist, the thin leather in the junction of brace and guard. He wraps his fingers loosely around slender bones, an easy enough grip to break. Every action is the same as the night before, and Iruka wills Kakashi to understand. To _want_ to understand. 

He guides Kakashi’s hand across the space between them, pulling him in until his fingers rest on Iruka’s collarbone. He wishes Kakashi would bridge that gap himself, cross that chasm again of his own volition, but this is enough. Iruka will show him that there’s really no chasm at all—not if Kakashi doesn’t want there to be.

This time, Iruka doesn’t let go of Kakashi’s hand. He rests his own over it, keeping Kakashi’s palm pressed to him. He wonders if Kakashi can feel the fast thud of his heart through the thick layers of flak vest and leather. It’s strong enough that it seems as though he should.

Iruka gives freedom to Kakashi’s fingers, freedom to speak, but they only tremble against his chest. Iruka draws a deep breath and asks his question once more. “Why, then?”

There are long, long moments in which Iruka starts to believe Kakashi is going to pull away, draw back the way he’s done so many times as his true self. But then his fore and middle fingers curl and the pattern comes, shaky but clear.

_‘Guilt.’_

Iruka’s lips turn down, processing that answer. The hound mask is blank as always, revealing nothing of the expression below. “But not because of me?” 

Again, Kakashi shakes his head. 

Iruka’s looks through the trees, eyes landing on the memorial stone itself. “Because of someone there?” 

This time, the response is affirmative. Iruka nods as well, chewing on his lip as he considers the answer. 

He always knew his ANBU was in mourning; that although he clearly didn’t mind listening to Iruka (at least for several years), he couldn’t have been going solely for that. But this makes him think that there’s a deeper reasoning behind the sudden absence, layers of regret that Iruka can’t begin to fathom. Except for one phrase that he’s heard whispered in the halls, that gives a single, lonely clue: 

‘Friend-Killer Kakashi’. 

That isn’t Iruka’s place to ask. Not now, maybe not ever. But Kakashi is waiting for something. Iruka doesn’t know if it’s acceptance, or a dismissal, or something else altogether.

Iruka just knows what he himself wants.

“Will you come see me again?” 

There’s a slow intake of breath, one that brings their chests nearly close enough to touch. Kakashi turns his face towards the memorial, and Iruka catches the barest hint of long, shiny silver hair within the shadow of the hood. 

This isn’t a transformation jutsu. That confirms several things and opens doors to others.

Kakashi looks back, and Iruka watches carefully, expecting another nod. The answer instead comes pressed against his skin.

_‘Yes.’_

That’s enough. He smiles and curls his fingers around Kakashi’s hand, lowering them together. He wants to say more, just like he always does when it comes to Kakashi—instead, he squeezes the gloved hand in gentle comfort. 

Unfortunately, his team is waiting. 

“Good.” Iruka whispers, a soft sigh parting his lips. Reluctantly, he draws back, the pads of his fingers brushing against Kakashi’s hand as he steps away. “Thank you, Inu-san.”

He waits for a single moment, for something that doesn’t come. 

Then he leaves, racing towards the gates to depart the safety of Konoha once again.

Kakashi’s name no longer appears on the list of returning shinobi. Iruka’s mission lasts the expected few weeks and he’s rotated back into the mission desk, which has finally started to function as normal. He scans the list automatically each time it’s delivered, though he knows ANBU are never recorded. It’s a habit. Kakashi’s reassignment is all but confirmed after two months of absence.

Iruka is retrieving A-rank mission assignments from the Hokage to seal in the outgoing scrolls cabinet when a loud pop sounds behind him. Shizune gasps and drops Tonton to the floor, who lets out a shocked squeal. Tsunade’s chair legs screech as she pushes back from her desk. Iruka whips around, scrolls clutched to his chest, and sees an ANBU in a torn and bloody cloak kneeling in the middle of the room, swaying dangerously as if about to collapse, and another ANBU with a sword poised an inch from their throat. 

It’s the first ANBU, the bloody one, that makes Iruka’s stomach fall through the floor.

It’s Kakashi.


	14. Chapter 14

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, there's actually a third story (short, maybe 20k, probably published in mid-July) that takes place in the same universe of Un/Spoken but features a different pairing, one that's hinted at in Un/Spoken but never really explored. The story hinges on a couple events in Un/Spoken, but it's a rarepair, so I'm not sure whether to post it as a third part of Un/Spoken or if that will just make people terribly disappointed when they see Iruka and Kakashi are only secondary characters... what do you guys think? Publish as part 3 of Un/Spoken, or separately and just mention in the summary that it's in the Un/Spoken universe?
> 
> Theoretical gold star if anyone can guess the pairing! xD (Hint: It doesn't involve Tenzo, sadly.)

Streaks of rust and muddy brown desecrate Kakashi’s ANBU cloak, caked dry in places, fresh and shiny in others. A large patch soaks into the cloth on his shoulder, as if someone upended a glass of blood over him. It’s not out of the question. Iruka thinks that it might belong to someone else, because while there are small tears in the fabric, as if it caught on brambles or thorns while carelessly racing through, there are no large gashes that would account for that sort of blood loss. At least, not through the cloak. Perhaps there are more hidden beneath. The more immediate concern is the gleam of the sharp metal an inch from piercing Kakashi’s larynx.

“Stand down.” The Godaime barks. The ANBU who appeared with Kakashi withdraws her katana and sheaths it in one fluid motion. Iruka releases a shaky breath. “Iruka-sensei, leave us.” 

Kakashi’s head snaps up, startling a jerk from Iruka. Even his mask is marred by debris, the porcelain an off-white in the spots where it isn’t littered by blood and soil. Iruka doesn’t want to leave, wants to run to Kakashi and check him from head to toe for wounds—but the Hokage is a master medic, and the order in her voice is absolute. Iruka nods, muttering vague goodbyes through a haze of adrenaline, and forces his feet to carry him out the door. 

The scrolls are still clutched to Iruka’s chest, nearly crushed in his grip. He races through possibilities, jogging through the halls and dodging other shinobi on automatic. By the time he reaches the mission desk and completes the seals to lock the A-rank scrolls in their compartment, he has a planned course of action.

“Sayuri-san,” Iruka’s question comes out too sharp, and the short black bob turns to him in alarm. “Can you cover the rest of my shift?”

It’s only an hour, and the room is nearly empty at this time of day. But it’s something Iruka has never asked before. Sayuri’s eyes are wide, concerned, and she nods in assent. Iruka gives her a brief thanks, promises to himself that he’ll find a way to repay her later, and is out the door in a second. 

If Kakashi is injured, he’ll be taken to the hospital or ANBU headquarters, neither of which would allow Iruka in to see him. If Kakashi’s report requires immediate action on his part (Iruka shudders to think of him being sent directly back into the field in that condition), then once more, Iruka won’t be able to do a thing. 

But if that blood was someone else’s, there’s a good chance that Iruka knows where Kakashi will go next. He has found the ANBU there once before, after all, with a gash in his arm deep enough to lacerate muscle, and a stiffness to his movements that spoke of broken ribs. The image of that boy in the dog mask, still as death and kneeling before the memorial stone, haunts Iruka’s vision as he jumps across rooftops. 

It’s a short journey, and near the end of it, Iruka can feel another presence coming up behind him at a rapid speed. 

Seconds after Iruka lands on the carved tree branch, Kakashi appears in front of him. Iruka is breathing heavily, entirely due to anxiety rather than the short trip. He rakes his eyes over Kakashi’s form as his satchel slides from his shoulder. It drops unnoticed to the ground six feet beneath them. 

Kakashi has always oscillated between unnatural stillness and aggressive kinesics; a coiled serpent laying in wait to strike. Now, his entire body is held in a state of rigor mortis, shoulders high and motionless other than the heaving of his chest as he breathes, hard and fast enough that Iruka can hear the air hitting the inside of his ceramic mask and echoing in the few inches between them. 

Iruka swallows thickly to clear his throat for speech. “Are you hurt?”

The question falls into the atmosphere and slowly sinks to the ground, a pebble in a bottomless lake. 

It takes long seconds, but ripples slowly form around the pebble, passing through Kakashi’s body in crests. He shivers, the hood of his cloak trembling. The motion makes it sway around his feet. He’s a metal suspension cord, pulled so taut that a single prod could cause it to snap. Iruka doesn’t want to be that prod, but he feels as though Kakashi is going to collapse under his own weight within minutes.

“Inu-san?” He whispers hoarsely, as if speaking more quietly will reduce any potential backlash. It won’t. “You’re shaking.” 

The tremors don’t stop, but after a moment, Kakashi’s mask tilts, looking down. His hands are clenched in fists at his sides, leather stretched thinly over his knuckles. Kakashi releases each finger, one by one, until they are limp and trembling with the rest of him. 

Shuffling forward a half-step, Iruka barely manages to raise a hand when Kakashi topples. He sucks in a breath as Kakashi’s weight crashes into him, one of his shoulder blades hitting painfully against an irregular piece of bark. His ponytail cushions any blow to his head, but jabs the holder into his scalp. Kakashi’s arms wrap around Iruka’s waist before the rest of him can follow. He can’t see anything except for smears of brown on the shoulder of Kakashi’s cloak, silver tufts where his hood has fallen around his ears, and the yellows and oranges of the forest beyond. 

Kakashi’s mask digs hard into Iruka’s shoulder, his palms flattening against Iruka’s spine. His knee presses between Iruka’s, and beneath the cloak Iruka can feel the hard line of the armored vest against his own flak jacket, and the ridge of a kunai holster on Kakashi’s thigh. 

And the tremors. 

Kakashi is still shaking. 

Iruka pulls his hands free and slides them over the ruined cloak, tentatively resting them on the small of Kakashi’s back. He squeezes his eyes shut and breathes in Kakashi’s scent. 

It would have been poetic for it to be soy sauce, dust, and dogs, but right now he just smells salty sweat, the metallic tang of iron. But it doesn’t matter. Nothing matters but Kakashi right there, against him, holding him, allowing _Iruka_ to comfort _him_. 

Perhaps it isn’t an allowance so much as a _need_ , consuming and desperate. 

Iruka never wants to let go. His chest swells with too many things, with swirls and loops and expansive colors that fill every hole as if they had never been made. Kakashi clings to him, presses them together as if he can absorb Iruka through his body heat alone. His shoulders quake, shudders wracking him, breath hitching and seizing as if he’s sobbing, but no actual sound escapes. He leans into Iruka as if the chuunin is the only thing holding him up. 

Maybe he is. 

Iruka rubs his palm in soothing circles on Kakashi’s back, throat filled with far too much, and yet nothing he can say. He doesn’t know if things will be alright. He doesn’t know what Kakashi has gone through, or who he might have lost on this latest mission. Kakashi doesn’t need foolish condolences or placations. He’s a warrior. And for the very first time, Kakashi has told Iruka exactly what he needs; through the alignment of their bodies and the fingers that dig desperately into his waist. 

The sun takes immeasurable time to sink past its zenith. Iruka’s shoulder grows numb from the press of Kakashi’s mask. At some point, his soothing circles travel up the length of Kakashi’s spine. As the trembling slowly starts to recede, Iruka leaves fingerprints on Kakashi’s back, and the nape of his neck. He caresses short, silky hairs, until he can feel thick locks against his palm. Either Kakashi hasn’t realized his hood is down, or he no longer cares. Iruka knows which he prefers, but it isn’t the time to ask.

Eventually, Kakashi’s chest rises deep and slow, breathing even. His entire being relaxes and pours around Iruka’s body like a liquid. 

Iruka starts to think he’s fallen asleep.

“Inu-san.” He breaths, barely a sound. Almost instantly, he wishes he hadn’t. Kakashi tries to pry his fingers from Iruka’s back, muscles bunching as he begins to pull away. 

Iruka doesn’t let him. He laces his fingers more securely in the fine hairs at Kakashi’s nape, palm pressing between his shoulder blades and preventing Kakashi from drawing back more than the few inches necessary for them to come face-to-face. Well, face-to-mask. Iruka’s shoulder prickles as blood starts to seep back into the gouge the porcelain had formed.

“Are you hurt?” Iruka whispers. Because he really wouldn’t put it past the notoriously self-sacrificing Kakashi to have been silently bleeding out in Iruka’s arms for the past couple hours. 

It takes a few seconds, but Kakashi shakes his head. 

Iruka exhales his relief. “Good.” He unburies his fingers from Kakashi’s hair, bringing them down to rest at the small of his back. He’s tired, and content, and has been turning an idea around for the last however long, so the words spill without much conscious thought. “Would you come home with me?”

Kakashi’s mask tips to the side, silent. 

Iruka’s eyes widen as he recognizes quite suddenly the way that offer could be taken. He’s abruptly conscious of the way Kakashi’s thighs bracket his own, the way he’s been caressing Kakashi with all the tender familiarity of a lover, the way their bodies have heated every particle between them. That heat suffuses his cheeks as he quickly backtracks. 

“Not—uh. For tea, I mean. Tea… helps. And I have clothes you can wear. With the mask, of course.” Either mask, though he doesn’t think Kakashi has realized he hasn’t used a transformation jutsu on his hair this time. Iruka fixates the largest patch of dried blood on Kakashi’s cloak rather than the black socket where he knows a single gray eye must be staring at him incredulously. 

Not that Iruka isn’t interested in Kakashi coming home for something more, something intimate, something that wouldn’t require a mask or new clothes at all—but this moment isn’t sexual. He isn’t trying to pressure Kakashi while he’s emotionally vulnerable, or make him think that Iruka is only interested in him if they can have a physical relationship as well.

Because he isn’t. Iruka _wants_ all of that. He _wants_ to wake up to Kakashi’s bare face beside him, to silver hair splayed against his pillow, eyes closed and body open. He wants to hear Kakashi’s thoughts as they come, unfiltered and freely given. But he accept what Kakashi can offer. Iruka believes now that he’s important to Kakashi— _respect, care, admire, trust, protect, affection_ —but sex and affection, even _love_ (not that Iruka is banking on the romantic sort), aren’t irrevocably intertwined. Iruka cares enough for Kakashi, Inu and all, that he can put aside his own desires. 

Unless he’s a fucking idiot and accidentally exposes them by his face glowing with the approximate luminescence of the sun, and increasing with every heartbeat Kakashi stares at him.

When Kakashi tries to pull back this time, Iruka lets him, acknowledging that he’s really fucked up. He truly hadn’t meant anything untoward, but Kakashi is retreating, Iruka can’t blame him, and—

Kakashi doesn’t separate entirely. He only puts enough space between them to slide his hand from Iruka’s back. It glides over his waist, palm and fingers feeling his abdomen, over his ribs. Iruka’s breath hitches. The exploration ends at Iruka’s collarbone, where Kakashi taps out a short message.

_‘Sorry. Sleep.’_

It is a rejection, but not the one Iruka was expecting. He frowns, nodding. It’s too vague to know exactly what Kakashi means, how he even took Iruka’s offer, but Iruka won’t press either way. Not yet. 

A tiny, growing voice warns him that, if Kakashi has his way, ‘not yet’ may last forever.

“Right. Ok. But, Inu-san…” 

Kakashi shakes his head, interrupting Iruka with firm punctuation. _‘Inu.’_

It’s so much like Kakashi’s repeated insistence on dropping his honorific that Iruka huffs a laugh, lips twitching into a smile. “Inu…”

Kakashi nods in approval. Iruka can almost imagine him wagging his tail. He wonders how he ever missed the obvious parallels between Inu and Kakashi, or the earnest person that lay within both. Iruka sighs, hands sliding to Kakashi’s slender hips. He can feel under the thin fabric of the cloak and the junction where vest and waistband meet. Sexual or not, he craves this closeness. If Kakashi isn’t going to break it, then he sure as hell isn’t. Maybe Kakashi doesn’t want to have sex with him, but Iruka no longer doubts that the jounin wants _something_. Hopefully it isn't just this.

“If you need me...” He feels that he needs to impress this point again. Maybe, one of these days, Kakashi will actually get it. “You can find me, no matter where I am. I want you to.”

Kakashi shivers, his fingers twitch against Iruka’s vest, and then he’s pulling away. Cool air swoops in to take his place, washing away any lingering traces of warmth as he disappears into the forest.

One other thing leaves Iruka unsettled, even as he makes the long, quiet trek to his apartment.

This time, Kakashi didn’t give any promises for the future. 

Nightmares, Iruka thinks, are a common theme across all of humanity, and yet utterly specific to the person involved. He’s heard his students talk about common ones like teeth falling out, or falling from a high place. But there are also the nightmares that they don’t say: ones about their families, friends, futures, pasts. Weird insects with shifting numbers of fangs, or cascading colors that create an unexplored, unfathomable galaxy that can swallow a person whole. 

Iruka’s nightmares have always been centered less around the concept of fear, and more of loss itself. 

Things he’s had once. Things he can never have again. 

Overall, the frequency of his nightmares have receded over the years, with the exception of the first few months following Mizuki’s betrayal. When they do occur, Iruka knows better than to try to go back to sleep. If he tries, he’ll just fall into another nightmare, bits and pieces of his previous one mixing with conscious anxieties and creating a maelstrom of grief that sucks him in like a void. 

Naruto is a late addition to the nightmares, first showing up around the time Mizuki’s green eyes began to fade. Now that Naruto if off training with Jiraiya, facing dangers that Iruka can’t see and can’t protect him from, Iruka sees blonde hair and whiskered cheeks more often than not. When he gets those, he makes tea, sits at his kotatsu, and looks over lesson plans from previous years, or tries in vain to read a book. One of the crime novels of the sort his dad used to love and he has never quite developed a taste for himself. 

When gray and silver steal his dreams—endless pale skin, scratchy blankets, and smears of dirt that Iruka brushes away with fantasy-confident hands—he opens his window and stares into the trees behind his apartment complex. He never finds Kakashi there, never really expects to. But it eases the tight ache in his stomach, the longing for something concrete and real that he shouldn’t be having nightmares about in the first place, because it’s never really happened. He can’t lose something he hasn’t gained. He’s only tasted it. Never devoured. 

Those nights seem to last forever.

Between Mizuki, Orochimaru, and missions, Iruka has enough motivation to last for a lifetime of training. It’s not that he was ever a slouch; he enjoys the burn in his muscles from a long jog, sunshine warming his skin, the sensation of purpose that comes with training and exertion. But after becoming a teacher, he let himself relax to a degree, accepting that he would never make jounin and coming to terms with that fact with surprising ease. The vast majority of shinobi never make jounin, after all. Some never even achieve chuunin. Perception can be skewed because the jounin make such names for themselves, littering Bingo Books and existing in whispers between the lower ranks. But in reality, they’re a small minority, and Iruka doesn’t want to be sent out of the village regularly on A-ranks, anyway. He’s happy teaching, knows that he can make a difference in Konoha without a full arsenal of deadly techniques and scores of successful assassinations. The Sandaime taught him that.

Except that now, Iruka knows that ‘good enough’ is never good enough. There are people to protect in the village itself. He will never have the strength of Might Guy, or the genjutsu of Kurenai, or the… literally _anything_ of Hatake Kakashi. But he has his own strengths, and he can play to those. He can be prepared the next time a mission goes sour, or when invading forces take down Konoha’s walls once again. Iruka needs to be better than he was when he failed to protect Naruto. He needs to be _more_.

A large part of that is expanding his repertoire of fuinjutsu and finding creative ways to utilize traps. In all of the basics, Iruka is extremely competent. He couldn’t be a teacher otherwise. It’s just that he doesn’t have anything _special_ , anything that gives him a unique advantage. He isn’t a prodigy or a genius, doesn’t have a large amount of chakra or any specific clan jutsu outside of a couple seals. He’ll have to find other ways to compensate. 

Iruka starts spending more time on the training grounds. It’s not enough to be able to perform a perfect kick in front of his students; he needs it to be instinctive, for his body to react on it’s own while his mind is leaping ahead to the next step, giving him time to lay traps, build chakra, form seals. Barrier jutsu comes pretty naturally to him, but that isn’t of any help unless he can immobilize his target long enough to capture them. 

So, repetition. 

It also helps to keep his mind off of other things. Like pale bastards who apparently don’t want to take a damn hint. It _aches_ to think that Kakashi truly doesn’t want more than the occasional meeting in a tree with masks and cloaks between them. Perhaps he relies on the anonymity, believes in it as a barrier that protects him from the vulnerability of exposing his actual self. Iruka can understand that; he used to feel the same way about his ANBU. But they aren’t kids anymore. Iruka is tired of codenames and uncertainty. He doesn’t want to play pretend for the rest of his life, and he can’t see any way to get truly close to either Kakashi _or_ Inu as long as they are. It doesn’t have to be sex or romance. Just… something open. Real.

So, repetition. 

It’s hot for the middle of fall, more from humidity and sunshine than temperature. It isn’t helped by the sweat that beads on his brow, sticking slick strands of hair to his neck as they fall from his ponytail. His bones jar as he kicks the post, a satisfying thud that radiates from his shin to his torso. He channels a small amount of chakra to his leg as he works, concentrating it on the exact point his leg meets the post. Not enough to cause damage to the wood, but enough to strengthen his own body’s resistance, allowing him to do it again, and again, and again, without bruising. 

Well. Without bruising _too_ much. 

Iruka works until he can barely breathe, until his lungs ache as much as his legs and drops of sweat fall from his chin. He sucks in grateful gasps of oxygen when he gets both feet on the ground, savoring the burn in his thighs. Pulling the hem of shirt up to wipe his brow stains the fabric a darker emerald. His sweats are aptly named and growing damp at the waistband, but dusty where they’ve met debris from the pole too-long exposed to the elements. 

He feels good. 

Water is a welcome respite, though he’s careful not to drink too much. He learned that lesson as an overly rambunctious pre-genin. He breaks away, gasping, and wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. 

The awareness of someone watching him dawns like a wave. It’s an emanation that’s not quite chakra, not quite bloodlust, but entirely present. His blood is still racing, never stopped, and he turns on instinct. One hand raises to block an incoming attack, water bottle falling from his grip. The other rips his kunai from the bandage holster on his thigh, the one he never leaves home without. His eyes don’t have time to focus before he’s knocked back into the training post, an assailant grasping his wrist and his shoulder, pinning him. Iruka’s free hand is the one with the kunai, and he raises it, poised to slice through a carotid. 

Before his water bottle even hits the ground, the attacker’s hand slides from Iruka’s shoulder to his wrist and wrenches, hard. Pain shoots through his arm as the motion forces his fingers to relax against his will. The kunai falls and Iruka tries to bring up his knee to slam into the person’s diaphragm, but there’s no part of him left unrestrained. A body is pressed entirely against his, both of his wrists are pinned to the training post above his head, disrupting any purchase. True fear laces through him, slick and cold. There’s no doubt his assailant intends to kill, not with the murderous intent boiling through his flesh. 

The killing strike doesn’t come.

Iruka’s eyes contract and focus, bringing into clarity a red and white blur an inch from his nose. 

A dog mask.

The shock of that sight is somewhat outweighed by the stifling, oppressive air of Kakashi’s intentions. Iruka can’t see anything behind the ANBU mask. He can’t _feel_ anything either, other than bloodlust. Kakashi is breathing almost as heavily as Iruka, their chests brushing with each expansion of their ribs.

With the understanding of his attacker’s identity comes the knowledge that Iruka can’t win a fight. The only way to end this peacefully is by showing he’s not a threat. It takes too many seconds, but Iruka starts relaxing his muscles, one by one. His hands, his arms. Kakashi’s grip is too tight, painful, the pull of his shoulders too much against his scar tissue. 

For the first time since the hospital, Iruka makes a distinction between Kakashi and Inu. This isn’t Hatake Kakashi—it’s an ANBU, trained to kill.

It’s harder than it looks, relaxing while potential death is staring him in the face. But Iruka manages by slowing his own breaths, consciously taking in as much of Kakashi as he can. No injuries that Iruka can see, but that doesn’t necessarily mean much. No cloak, either, and the fingers that constrict his wrists are bare rather than gloved. There’s no indication as to why Iruka’s being pinned against a training post and smothered in nonverbal death threats. 

Speaking is a risk, but eventually, Iruka can’t stand the wait. His voice is low and hoarse, scraping against the tension in his throat. “Your killing intent is throwing me off a bit here.” 

No reaction. 

Iruka’s tongue darts out to lick his dry lips, trying to remember the training he’s had about ‘friendly threats’. Kakashi’s fingers tighten and Iruka winces. There’s no doubt going to be bruises. At this point, any tighter and Iruka will be looking at muscular damage. 

“Inu,” he tries to soften his tone, reach past the adrenaline to find the one he uses for the youngest students when they get hurt. Calm, soothing, instructional. “You need to let go of me.” Kakashi’s grip doesn’t get worse, but it doesn’t loosen, either. “Inu, you’re hurting me. _Let go._ ”

Something about that has to seep through, because Kakashi twitches once, twice. Blood starts flowing into Iruka’s hands again, replacing numbness with pins and needles. They’re still touching in every other way, Kakashi’s fingers loosely grasping his wrists, so Iruka doesn’t move other than to twitch his fingers to relieve the stinging, and to breathe a sigh of relief. He is intensely aware that a single wrong move could set off offensive instincts a mile wide.

A minute or two pass, Iruka’s pulse gradually retarding, along with their increased respiration. When Kakashi comes back to life, Iruka thinks he’s going to let go, but he doesn’t. Not entirely. 

His palms slowly slide down Iruka’s forearms, fingers twitching and prodding, as if testing the muscles there. Iruka keeps his wrists where Kakashi placed them, over his head as calloused hands feel Iruka’s shoulders. One comes to rest at his clavicle, exerting gentle pressure to keep him pinned to the pole. 

As if Iruka has any intention of moving before Kakashi proves he’s regained sanity. 

Iruka freezes when Kakashi’s right hand slides to his throat. 

If this were anyone except Kakashi, Iruka might not have been able to keep still, might have tried to fight instinctually and ended up dead as a result. But his trust for Kakashi, and the fact that the jounin’s bloodlust is slowly dwindling, play major factors in Iruka’s ability to keep calm. Kakashi’s thumb rests against his Adam's apple, a gentle pressure that means he must feel Iruka swallow. The rest of his fingers splay across the curve of Iruka’s neck. Kakashi leans his lower body further into him. It’s reminiscent of what he has done before, closer to leaning against a precious support than obstructing an enemy’s movement. It gives Iruka the courage to attempt speech again.

“Inu,” he whispers. He doesn’t get to finish, because his mind goes blank when Kakashi’s thumb traces Iruka’s chin, stroking over the smooth skin of his jaw.

Iruka realizes that the bloodlust isn’t gone; it’s been replaced by lust of a different sort. 

Kakashi’s palm is cool against his flushed face and throat. Iruka is sure his own eyes are wide and dilated, but Kakashi definitely isn’t paying attention. His mask tips down, watching his own left hand as it slides down from Iruka’s shoulder, across the thin material of his t-shirt, and ghosts over a covered nipple. Iruka keeps a tight rein on his reaction, barely twitching at Kakashi’s hand travels ever lower. 

By the time it finds Iruka’s waistline, he’s dizzy with the mess of emotions, the sharp shifts from adrenaline to concern to carnal hunger. He can’t put this off to a platonic desire for contact. Not as Kakashi’s palm slips under Iruka’s shirt, pressing over his abs, firm and steady against Iruka’s sweat-slicked skin. It rests there while the other hand, the one on Iruka’s neck, reaches out a thumb to carefully trace his lower lip. He pulls down slightly, parting them until Iruka’s breath would fall against Kakashi’s skin. If he were actually breathing right now. 

Kakashi’s fingertips press into Iruka’s ribs and his thumb leaves his mouth, sliding his palm higher, over Iruka’s cheekbone, catching on the damp fabric of his hitai-ate. There’s a dragging sensation, something against his forehead, but Iruka doesn’t realize what it is until it’s too late. He startles as the fabric starts to fall over his eyes, snapping a hand out automatically to cover Kakashi’s wrist. Panic flashes like knives in his gut.

There’s no murderous intent now, and Kakashi pauses the instant Iruka touches him. Although his head tilts to the side, he doesn’t continue lowering the hitai-ate. Iruka feels the primal awareness of a man trapped in a dark cave with a lion, sensing the predator stalking his periphery. He doesn’t think he’s in danger anymore, not from Kakashi. But the idea of losing his vision, one of his last defenses, terrifies him. 

“ _Please_.” 

Kakashi’s voice has never sounded like this before. Rough, husky, _pleading_. 

Iruka wants to see the face behind the mask, wants to know why the hell Kakashi chooses now of all times to finally speak to him... but his response would be the same. That one word makes Iruka come undone. A soft sound falls from his lips, voice to his emotions rather than his thoughts. Iruka can feel Kakashi all around him, against him. He can feel the jut of his hipbone, Kakashi’s fingers splayed over his ribs.

This is Kakashi again.

Iruka lets go of Kakashi’s wrist, unspoken permission. It comes to rest instead on the man’s hip. He sees nothing in the mask, but he can feel everything as the cloth slips over his eyes and presses them closed.

There’s the sound of rustling and a soft thump beside Iruka’s head. He can’t visualize, but he can smell Kakashi around him: salt and coffee, heat and metal. Then comes a soft puff of air against his cheek, and Iruka has just enough time to comprehend that _it’s Kakashi’s breath, with no mask, no porcelain, no cloth_ —and then their lips meet. 

Kakashi’s mouth is firm, explorative. It’s searing, but perhaps that’s just Iruka and the blood struggling to rush both to his face and groin. Iruka has kissed a few people, so he moves along with Kakashi, never passive, but he’s quickly consumed by Kakashi’s earnest persistence. Entrapped by the way he tilts his head to fit them perfectly together. Iruka can feel stubble against his chin. He tries to open his eyes only to see darkness around him. 

Iruka thinks he’s the one trembling now, or maybe both of them. Kakashi is holding him as if they’ll both shake to pieces if he doesn’t. The hand on Iruka’s ribs curves around his waist. The other cups his neck, tugging at Iruka’s hair and pulling some loose from the messy ponytail.

Kakashi’s kiss is languid but intense, never rushed but always pressing for more. The first hot, wet glide of his tongue against Iruka’s makes him suck in a harsh breath, dizzy with the sensations. Iruka’s nails dig into Kakashi’s skin and he gives a throaty hum. Desire builds between them. It’s a gradual blooming, friction and frisson and exquisite need gaining momentum with every second that they connect. Kakashi’s canines are sharp, Iruka learns when they nip at his lip, sucking it between his teeth and drawing from Iruka a low moan.

Need burns to embers in his belly. It flares into bright lights behind his eyelids, like chakra fireworks. A mutual shift has them slotting together perfectly, Kakashi’s hardness pressing into Iruka’s thigh. Kakashi jerks forward reflexively, a groan rumbling from his chest. Iruka’s loose sweatpants do nothing to hide his own desire, and when Kakashi gives a single thrust, the pressure against sensitized flesh is bliss.

Until everything stops. 

Kakashi’s mouth disappears. Iruka sways forward, bereft as cool air brushes the moisture on his lips. Kakashi’s chest rising and falling is the only movement, and damn if Iruka knows why. 

It’s only his blindness that keeps him from reaching out and pulling Kakashi back in. “Ka—Inu?” Iruka murmurs, confused and dazed. Then Kakashi rips himself away, taking every ounce of exquisite pressure with him. Iruka’s hands hover for a moment where Kakashi used to be, and then he slowly reaches for his hitai-ate. He can’t see what’s happening, but he doesn’t feel any other chakra signatures in the field around them. He listens closely for any sign of footsteps, but the only sounds are of naturally rustling leaves and their own harsh breathing. 

“Inu, what—” Iruka questions. He allows his mother’s jutsu to well in his palm. It bursts forth, but the sparks show nothing except for Kakashi’s lightning static several feet away, and an average songbird at least a hundred feet off. 

His stomach is quickly sinking to his knees as he realizes that there is no danger, no reason for Kakashi to stop. 

Except for Iruka. 

He starts to pull up his hitai-ate. “Why—” 

“I’m sorry.” Kakashi whispers. Those two words shatter everything: the space between them, Kakashi’s voice, Iruka’s hope. 

He scrambles to rip off the cloth, but by the time his eyes flutter open and adjust to the blinding light… Kakashi is gone.

And Iruka is alone.


	15. Chapter 15

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so sorry about the weird chapters disappearing and reappearing thing... Apparently one chapter was double-saved and so I had to delete it and... basically, I suck at technology. Horribly. >.> I'm so sorry to everyone whose comments got lost! I think I managed to respond to everyone before that, but maybe not? Anyway, my sincere apologies, and thank you all for your support and (hopefully) forgiveness.

Iruka hurts. His right wrist in particular, the one Kakashi wrenched to disarm. The kunai lays on the ground at Iruka’s feet, along with his water bottle. The pink stripes from Kakashi’s fingers are starting to deepen in color, edging towards red; no real damage, but bruises and lingering soreness. Not entirely unlike the tingling in his lips, the overly sensitive, slightly swollen flesh that proves without a doubt this wasn’t just a crazy genjutsu.

Which means that Kakashi really did pin him, kiss him, apologize, and leave. 

Three things out of that list make Iruka want to punch someone. A Copy-nin, specifically. Those three are also the reason that the hurt extends far past the burst capillaries in his wrists.

The first thing Iruka thinks has nothing to do with emotions, but the shinobi training that forces him to consider whether Kakashi might constitute a lingering threat to the village. There is no question that it was bloodlust Iruka felt at first, and his growing bruises can attest that Kakashi wasn’t entirely in control of himself. But the bloodlust dissipated, and he became lucid enough to stop when Iruka grabbed him. 

An ability to obey orders means he isn’t a threat to anyone else. Good. One problem solved. 

He even _spoke_ , and uttering three words is practically loquacious coming from Kakashi. 

Or Inu. 

Iruka rubs the heels of his palms into his eyes and a distressed groan interrupts the peaceful quiet of the clearing. 

After assessing the threat and deciding on a course of action (if relaxing and letting things happen can be called ‘action’), Iruka had stopped analyzing the situation the way he should. He reacted to Kakashi’s desire as if it were oil pouring on the embers that had been stirring in Iruka for months. Years, if he was honest with himself. It didn’t even occur to Iruka at the time that Kakashi’s need, his desperation, was purely a by-product of epinephrine and aggressive instincts. 

Iruka knows some people like to come down from a mission with sparring, and he knows that those spars can sometimes go too far. He’s also heard about sex as a coping method, and while he’s never done it himself, he can easily understand why it would work. It gives similar chemical reactions as fighting, provides strong sensory distraction, releases tension....

Which is what Kakashi was doing. Releasing tension.

Is the fact that it was Iruka a coincidence? Does Kakashi normally end missions that way, and just didn’t have any of his usual prospects available? Even if he hadn’t specifically been looking for sex, he might have reacted to a warm body pressed against his before realizing the implications of exactly who it was. 

_“I’m sorry.”_

Iruka rips out his hair band. He runs his fingers through the sweaty locks before mechanically replacing it, obscuring the worst evidence of their interlude. He goes through the motions of packing up, walking home, taking a shower, all while his blood runs thick and his stomach churns with vicious nausea. 

Iruka doesn’t do casual sex. As Izumo and Kotetsu might say, Iruka doesn’t really do ‘casual’ at all. He gives himself fully to anything he does, people included. It’s why he wouldn’t let himself see Mizuki’s flaws, why he has the exact same friends now as he did when he was twelve. It’s why he’s only had sex with a single person in his entire life; not long after that he recognized his attraction for Kakashi and steadfastly ignored any other opportunities that came his way. 

Hatake Kakashi is the very definition of casual. At least, that’s what he wants to show the world. Even this whole Inu persona is a way of hiding his actual self behind a faceless shield. It gives Kakashi control over their interactions, allows him to hold Iruka at arms length and only give what parts of himself he chooses to. _Commitment issues_ , Iruka thinks with a laugh like used coffee-grounds—bitter, soggy, useless, and clogging up his throat. 

There is something that Iruka learned from Mizuki: not all relationships are reciprocal. All the good intentions in the world aren’t going to fix something that has never been properly balanced in the first place. Ignoring that will only make the disparity grow until neither side can see where they want to be, let alone a way to get there. 

In this case, Iruka doubts that Kakashi fully realizes the divide he has placed between them. He doesn’t think Kakashi looks down on him, or resents him, or pities him. Not anymore. Iruka isn’t honestly sure which of them is getting more out of this… thing. Is it a friendship? 

It’s a bond, at least.

Iruka sits naked on his bed. Cold water drips from the ends of his hair and runs over scar tissue that goes far deeper than skin. But it _has_ scarred over, has healed. It’s no longer a raw, festering wound. It’s no longer something that Iruka dreads seeing in the mirror. 

The marks on his wrists are surface-level by comparison. He starts healing them absently, the balance of chakra nearly second-nature to him now. He wouldn’t bother if they weren’t so obvious, but he doesn’t want people asking questions. 

What Iruka _does_ know is that everything he and Kakashi have built is on shaky ground. Toothpicks secured by anonymity and fantasies and misconceptions. If they are going to be anything, Iruka needs to know what that is. He can accept just friendship. Iruka thinks that anyone who would demand sex or romance in order to care for someone, probably doesn’t deserve being cared for at all. 

Sure, it would hurt. Sure, Iruka would probably spend years wondering what could have been and chasing away dreams filled with a longing so deep it burns like flesh knitting closed under the force of chakra healing. 

He’s used to that. He can do it. He wouldn’t blame Kakashi for it, and he would rather have Kakashi’s friendship than nothing at all. 

But Iruka has to know that he has at least that. He has to know whether or not he can ever have more. He has to know that, if he wants to, he can find Kakashi through more than hours and weeks and months of waiting at the memorial stone.

_“I’m sorry.”_

It’s sometime after his bruises are healed and his hair has dripped dry that shame and guilt start to sink in. As always, Iruka has been thinking of himself as a healer, thinking that he’s helping Kakashi by being there without pushing for anything more. But in reality, he has been hiding from his own fears, as well. Iruka has made it pretty damn obvious he’s interested in Kakashi, sure, but he hasn’t actually asked for an answer. Most importantly, he’s known Inu’s identity for months and never done more than coyly hint at it like a shy pre-genin. He’s been thinking like he’s protecting Kakashi, withholding the truth to keep Kakashi from feeling uncomfortable, but really… Iruka has been scared, too. Scared to risk alienating the person who holds so much of him. 

This charade, this game… it isn’t good for either of them.

It’s strange to be getting dressed in the middle of the afternoon. Iruka puts up his hair, slips on his uniform, and starts to zip his flak jacket before he remembers that he’s not actually going off to do battle. Not the physical kind, at least. If he needs exploding tags and a plethora of shuriken while confessing to Kakashi, he’s going to be killed flat anyway.

Iruka has never been to the jounin apartments before. They’re small compared to Iruka’s family-sized housing, as most of the jounin either live in clan compounds or spend so little time in the village that they don’t need more than a place to sleep. He figures that’s the best place to start looking. Inu won’t be at the memorial stone now. Kakashi may, but Iruka would rather not have this confrontation there if he can help it. It holds too much history, for both of them. 

It’s strange to be searching an area more vertical than horizontal, and it takes Iruka two tries to get the pressure of the seal high enough to sense the upper floors of the apartment building. Anxiety and steely determination wage war in his bones as he climbs the stairs. 

At least Kakashi seems to be alone.

Once Iruka is staring at the cracked wood of Kakashi’s door, it takes him longer than he would care to admit to summon the courage to knock. He has purposefully not decided on what to say. He knows that if he does, he’ll make excuses not to go until he has the exact wording right, and that could take days. With an ANBU’s schedule, Iruka doesn’t have days.

After too many seconds, he takes a deep breath and gathers the lingering strings of his frustration, molding that into obstinate determination that overrides, at least by a modicum, the sweat licking his palms. 

Rapping sharply with his knuckles, Iruka waits. No sound of movement from inside. He frowns, annoyance helpfully kicking up a few notches. He waits ten seconds and knocks again. 

Drawing on the considerable lungs of an academy teacher, Iruka calls through the door.

“Kakashi!” 

Five seconds this time. Iruka sets off another burst of chakra, but no, Kakashi hasn’t run away. He’s sitting on either his bed or a chair, exactly the way he was before but with his head turned towards the door.

“I know you’re in there. You can’t hide.”

Nothing. It’s like dealing with a nine-year-old.

“I’m not bluffing, and I’m not going away. You might as well open the door.”

Two seconds, and then the soft creaking of bedsprings. Iruka swears, if Kakashi escapes through the window—

The door opens a scant few inches. Only half of Kakashi’s body is visible, revealing a jounin uniform, minus vest and boots. He leans casually against the door jam, his visible eye arched in a smile. “Iruka. What a pleasant surprise.”

Iruka would bet his entire (not too considerable) savings that Kakashi would rather see anyone else right now. Iruka squares his jaw and chooses the polite, yet steely tone he uses for particularly dreadful parents. “May I come in?”

“Ah, now isn’t the best time, sensei. I’m afraid I’m a bit busy at the moment. Perhaps tomorrow?” Kakashi has the nerve to start shutting the door, igniting the last bit of civility Iruka had gathered into flames. 

“No, we’re doing this now.” Stepping forward, Iruka puts a hand on the door and forcefully pushes past. Not that Kakashi couldn’t stop him if he wanted to, but he doesn’t. He steps back, avoiding contact like Iruka is carrying a plague. 

The chuunin’s head of steam carries him into the middle of the room. A surprisingly bare room. Other than a few books (he can see several garish covers that can only be Jiraiya’s works, along with a few others), the only personal decorations Iruka can see are a half-dead houseplant and two photographs: one of Team Seven, and one of the Fourth Hokage with three children. One of them is an adorably sullen, two-eyed Kakashi, and the other two Iruka doesn’t recognize. 

He would bet his mother’s jutsu scroll that three out of the four in that photo are no longer living.

The door clicks shut. “What can I do for you, sensei?” Kakashi asks, sounding bored. When Iruka turns around, he’s slouching against the door, ankles crossed and hands shoved in his pockets. A deadly blade in a deceptive paper scabbard. 

Iruka is suddenly faced with the enormous level of this potential fallout. At the very least, Kakashi will probably be angry that Iruka didn’t confess to finding Inu’s real name earlier. At the worst, he’ll ask Iruka exactly how he figured it out and report him to the Hokage for deliberately searching for an ANBU’s identity. Actually, considering Kakashi’s purportedly self-sacrificing nature, maybe he’ll blame himself and ask the Godaime for disciplinary action for himself for using his guise as Inu so freely. And then run away before the punishment can be exacted. Because Hatake Kakashi apparently excels at evading anything and everything that doesn’t have a distinct chance of killing him. The lethal situations, he runs towards head first. 

Kakashi _kissed him_. And he didn’t even get to see under the damn mask.

Iruka’s thoughts aren’t very linear at the moment.

Clenching his fists and clearing his throat, Iruka lifts his stare to meet Kakashi’s droopy eyes, and says with as much determination and challenge as he can muster:

“I want to know why you kissed me.” 

Iruka was kind of expecting a flippant dismissal, to have to prove with point-by-point evidence that he knows Kakashi and Inu are the same person. Instead, while Kakashi’s body freezes, his eye grows larger than Iruka has ever seen it, shock painted clearly in gray irises. There’s movement beneath his mask and his gaze unfocuses, then flickers lightning fast to the window over Iruka’s shoulder. Iruka can already see his spine straightening as he considers the most efficient escape route.

“Hatake Kakashi, I swear to the Shodaime that if you run away again, I’m going to make your life a living _hell_.” 

That seems to grab Kakashi’s attention. His eyelid droops as he looks back to Iruka. He pushes off the doorframe, though he doesn’t step forward or dive out the window. His tone and glare are polished steel, frigid and scornful--the chuunin exams all over again. “What are you talking about?” 

Iruka expected this, he did, but somehow it still manages to sting. He takes a half-step back before he can stop himself, and then flushes at his own cowardice. He isn’t going to let this faze him again. This is just Kakashi’s defense, and Iruka has gotten past it before. 

Crossing his arms over his chest, Iruka tilts up his chin and goes on the offensive himself, starting at the top of what he imagines to be Kakashi’s list of concerns. He’ll break down the layers, bit by bit, until Kakashi has no choice but to face this. 

Even if the answer isn’t what Iruka wants to hear.

“Don’t even try that, Kakashi. There’s no point lying. It’s not like I’m going to run and tell the Godaime. You didn’t purposefully give away your identity, so you didn’t technically break code. Why can’t you just—” 

Iruka cuts himself off when he hears the uneven edge in his voice. He lets out a frustrated breath. Layer by layer, layer by layer. Iruka keeps wanting to charge forward, but his own emotions aren’t what’s most important here. Not at the moment. “You know that was dangerous, right? _You_ were dangerous. You shouldn’t have been in the village, in that state.”

Kakashi’s shoulders fall. His head tips down. Resignation lines his quiet response. 

“I know.” 

That… isn’t what Iruka expected. 

It isn’t what he wants. 

Kakashi doesn’t look like a student suitably chastised, but a warrior confessing his sins after coming home from the battlefield. He looks pained, grieved beyond anything Iruka could possibly say. 

Iruka’s anger washes away. He closes his eyes to block out that vision, and shakes his head slightly. Taking a deep breath, Iruka lets go of that grievance. 

_That_ one. 

“Just tell me why you did it.”

“I… just got back from a mission.” Kakashi says haltingly, like he has to search for each word before finding it. Iruka watches his silver brow furrow. “I wasn’t thinking. I was trying to find somewhere to work out my adrenaline. I saw you, and—”

It’s the guilt and self-recrimination in his voice that make it clear to Iruka they aren’t talking about the same thing. Again. “I’m not asking why you pinned me.” That much, Iruka has worked out on his own. “I mean, why did you kiss me?” 

Kakashi blinks, seemingly uncomprehending. That doesn’t bode well for Iruka’s lingering hope. He rubs at his scar as his face heats. “I know what happens when people get back from the types of missions ANBU are sent on. I know a lot of people use sex as a coping mechanism. In that state, a lot of people don’t care who they…” Iruka doesn’t have a problem cursing, though he’s never formed the habit because it isn’t conducive to the role of a teacher. (Why teaching children to murder is fine, but saying ‘fuck’ isn’t, he will never understand.) But now, he can’t bring himself to use such a callous word when he’s hoping it was anything but. 

He squares his shoulders and forces himself to meet Kakashi’s stare. “Who they’re with. So, my question is… did you care? Would you have done that to anyone, or…” He hates the waver in his voice, but he presses on. He’s made it this far, he can’t back down now. That would just start the same damn loop over again. “Was it because it was me?” 

Kakashi eye presses closed. Silence hangs, and for a moment, Iruka isn’t certain he’ll get an answer. Then a decision is apparently made. He meets Iruka’s gaze and answers, quietly but with no uncertainty.

“Because it was you.”

Iruka lets out a deep, shuddering breath. The relief that admittance brings is palpable, but it’s… strangely muffled. Iruka thought he would feel more surprise, actually hearing that Kakashi wants him. Common decorum probably dictates he should. After all, Iruka is just Iruka. Chuunin, average, all shades of brown and boring mission desk duties and reliable hours. Kakashi is in the Bingo Book of every great nation, feared by shinobi the world over, a genius in every sense of the word. 

Other than in social interactions, apparently. Iruka glares and advances on Kakashi, fingers digging into his own biceps as he struggles against the urge to poke Kakashi, hard, in the ribs. 

"Do you know how long it's been?" Iruka demands furiously. Kakashi’s admittance gives him a certain level of confidence that he isn’t going to be mercilessly kicked out at any moment. That, apparently, is enough to break the dam of his self-restraint. "Over a _decade_ , I've known you were watching me. Over a _decade_ since I started thinking of you as my friend. Then, you disappeared, without a single trace. And maybe that was for a good reason, I don't know, but did you even _think_ about how it made me feel?" 

Iruka doesn’t derive the satisfaction he rightfully should from the shocked diameter of Kakashi’s eye, so he turns away and starts pacing the short strip of space available to him. "Then you left me that message. And I'm grateful for that, don't get me wrong, but do you know how frustrating it was, to know you were there, _alive_ , but with no idea how to reach you?” Iruka can’t convey the depth of his distress without waking up the entire apartment block, so he tries to make up for volume by gesturing vehemently and glaring with so many years of frustration that Kakashi seems to shrink closer to the door. “No idea why _you_ wouldn't reach out to _me_? Do you know how many hours I sat at the memorial stone, just waiting for you to appear?"

Pressure is building behind his eyes now, a familiar heat that Iruka refuses to let spill, indignation flowing forth instead. So many nights. Cold, and lonely, and empty, when they could have been filled with _Kakashi_. And maybe a lot of Iruka’s anger is directed at himself, too, but that doesn’t belay Kakashi’s idiocy in this whole thing. 

Instead of waiting for his mother, Iruka just waited for Kakashi instead.

"Then you came to the hospital, and I thought maybe you would come back after that, but you didn’t, not for months. You finally came only after I was certain, _once again_ , that you were dead. And you told me all those things,” beautiful, wonderful things, “and I thought _that_ time that something would change, that you would stay with me, but you didn't. Someone had to almost or literally _die_ for you to see me again, every single time. Has it ever occurred to you, Hatake Kakashi, in your _infinite genius_ , how much of an _asshole_ you are?" 

Iruka expects some sort of a reaction then, but Kakashi wilts like his plant, in subtle ways that most people would probably never notice, but which stand out to Iruka like glaring signs screaming distress. Cracks form at the corner of his eye, his shoulders draw back as if he’s trying to sink through the door, and he watches Iruka’s increasingly flushed features with--too much showing, too much exposed. Iruka can’t even decipher it all, but it’s _too much_. He’s never seen even this bare quarter of Kakashi’s face before, not during the few moments he has allowed himself to be vulnerable. Iruka turns away so fast he makes himself dizzy.

"I kept trying to get closer to you, in any way possible, and you just shut me down. I've respected your boundaries and tried not to push. I accepted that you didn’t want anything more.” Iruka thinks now that he was probably more than a bit selfish himself for not instigating this discussion a long time ago, but really, what was he supposed to think? He asked Kakashi on dates, multiple times, and never got more than a crappy mission report to show for it. “But then you—you _kiss_ me, and run away like a pre-genin! Even my students are more emotionally mature than you, and Asahi tried to cut off Kimiko's ponytail the other day because he thought it was _pretty_!" 

Kakashi cuts in abruptly, sounding… perplexed. "You're angry that I left? Not that I—kissed you?"

It’s such a strange question that Iruka stops and frowns. He turns around, bracing his hands on his hips as he peers at the little bit visible of Kakashi’s expression. "Why would I be angry that you kissed me?” Iruka thinks back to the event: to Kakashi’s _“please”_ , to the way he paused when Iruka grabbed him, and only continued after Iruka let go. There should be no conceivable way to misconstrue that. “I _let_ you kiss me. I thought I was pretty obvious with my consent there." 

Except Kakashi’s stare is some insane mix of awed and bewildered. Iruka’s frown cuts deeper as he steps closer. Out of all the misunderstandings they’ve had, this isn’t one he can see a reason for. "Why would I have kissed you back if I was angry about _that_?" 

Iruka watches with morbid fascination as maroon seeps into Kakashi’s cheeks, blooming over his mask until his pale skin is stained with color. “Maa…” Kakashi says hoarsely, the faux-casual tone betrayed by the coarse texture of his voice and the way he shifts his weight, turning his head to look at something that is anything except Iruka. “I sort of thought…” His mortification is so tangible that Iruka would feel it burning his palm if he reached out to touch. 

The next words are so rough that Iruka has to strain to discern them, and even then he doesn’t quite believe it. “You might have allowed it out of pity.”

Kakashi, Iruka thinks in that moment, is beautiful. 

He is intense, resilient, and cares so deeply that he melts like candle wax before _Iruka_. For the life of him, Iruka has no idea how Kakashi came to place that sort of importance on Umino Iruka, or how Kakashi could ever think a single thing about himself worthy of pity. The idea refuses to gain traction no matter how many seconds it turns around in his mind.

"You thought I let you kiss me because… I felt sorry for you?" Iruka moves closer again, until there’s only a foot of space between them. He’s trying to force Kakashi to look at him rather than darting his eye between Iruka and the window so fast they must be blurring into one image. Iruka lowers his voice, struggling to find the most convincing, gentle way to prove, beyond a shadow of a doubt, how fucking ridiculous that idea is. "Kakashi, that's the most idiotic thing you've ever said.” 

That’s probably not the best way to do it. Iruka winces and tries for a do-over, but it doesn’t come out much better. It would help if he had any clue why Kakashi would have gotten that notion in the first place. “I'm not that nice. In fact, that wouldn't even _be_ nice, that would be an awful thing to do. If I didn't want to kiss you, I would have pushed you away and said so. That would have been easier for both of us than stringing you along." 

Maybe Iruka’s earnesty is enough to convince Kakashi, maybe not. His face is still a vivid hue when he finally looks at Iruka again. "How long have you known?" 

Ah.

Iruka is the one who can’t hold Kakashi’s gaze this time, and he flushes in contrition. "A little while." He admits, rubbing at his scar.

"Before today?" 

The narrow question of the timeline, rather than insistence on complete specificity, catches Iruka’s attention. He pauses and then nods, watching carefully. He half-expects anger, or at least irritation. Kakashi sighs. His shoulders droop, some of the tension seeping out of his body. 

Iruka presses his lips together in contemplation, eyes narrowing as a thought occurs to him. It’s just a hunch, but there’s only one reason he can think of that Kakashi would be relieved that Iruka knew before today. He moves forward again until there’s scant inches between them, peering up into Kakashi’s reddened face. 

“I was attracted to Kakashi before Inu, you know. But even if I hadn’t been, it wouldn’t matter.” The way Kakashi’s expression carefully doesn’t change makes Iruka believe his suspicion is correct. It isn’t a pleasant thought. Iruka grimaces. “I'm not a child, Kakashi, and I knew from the beginning that Inu could have been almost anyone. I knew the risks. Besides, you and Inu aren't two different people. It's still _you_ that I want, either way."

"Do you?" Kakashi leaned forward very slightly, mortification apparently overridden by his desire to hear Iruka’s answer. "Want me?"

It’s so earnest, so open, that Iruka aches with fondness. 

_This_ is the man that met Iruka in trees. This is the person who told Iruka he cared for him, respected him, wanted to protect him--and this is also Kakashi, who is strong enough to tell Iruka the truth about the chuunin exams, wise enough to see that truth for himself, and horribly poor at seeing when others care for him just as much. 

Iruka regards him with tender exasperation. He reaches between them, fingers circling Kakashi’s bare wrist. The lack of gloves reminds Iruka of the sensation of Kakashi’s hands on his abdomen, his throat, curling into his hair. Iruka swallows at the heady sensation of smooth skin beneath his fingers. 

He honestly can’t understand how Kakashi could have missed this, but he doesn’t have a problem saying it. He never will. 

“Yes.” Iruka says simply. “I can’t believe they call you a genius.” He teases with a snicker, because he _can_ now, and trust Kakashi to stay there with him despite. 

Except, Kakashi isn’t exactly responding. Not the way Iruka would hope, at least. His eye is wide, stunned, and his breath is coming in small inhalations. There’s no relief, or pleasure, or… well, Iruka can’t tell what there is. Iruka’s smile fades as he waits for a reaction that doesn’t come. He sobers, a keen spike of unease hitting him. 

Because, while they have pretty well covered the past and present... Kakashi has once again given him no promise for the future. 

"Kakashi… what do you want from me?" 

Iruka waits with trembling nerve as his question sinks in.

Apparently, it sinks in like a fuma shuriken to the spine. 

Kakashi goes into shock. That’s the only way Iruka can describe it. The red flush ascends ever higher and Kakashi stares at Iruka like he’s expecting an impending attack. His chest falls in short, hyperventilating breaths, and his lips part beneath his mask. 

Iruka’s apprehension transforms into cold dread as long seconds pass. The only thing that keeps him from pulling away and beating a crushed, hasty retreat, is the way Kakashi’s hand slowly twists in his grips—twists, but not away. Kakashi aligns their palms and interleaves their fingers, holding on to Iruka tightly. Kakashi’s hand is clammy, uncertain, but he doesn’t let go. 

So Iruka waits, guilt and disappointment slowly building in his gut. Guilt because he doesn’t know why this question is such a stumper, but he hates that he’s caused this. He hates that Kakashi looks so confused, so scared, because of Iruka. And maybe Iruka had the right idea of not pressing for more, because he has never before seen Kakashi look vulnerable. 

He never wants to again.

"I don't know." 

It’s the broken whisper and the way Kakashi’s eye squeezes shut, as if speaking the words is physically painful, that finally jar Iruka into realizing exactly what this is: a panic attack. 

Hinata was prone to them, and Iruka had gotten better at helping her over the last year before her graduation. Mostly, what she always needed was a distraction, something to take her mind from whatever she was working herself into circles about. When it got really bad, when the panic reached a state where it was no longer centered on a rational fear and instead sparked at her mind with a life of its own, she needed a sensory change. Sometimes soothing music or a cold, perspiring drink shoved into her hands would disrupt the cycle long enough for her to slow her rapid breathing before she passed out. For Kakashi? Iruka has no clue, and the idea of doing something that makes it worse is horrifying. 

So he acts on instinct, on the only knowledge he has as to the possible cause of this: 

Kakashi is afraid of disappointing Iruka. Whether he believes he wants more than Iruka is willing to give, or less than Iruka requires. 

That fear is proof enough that Kakashi cares, in whatever way. That’s all Iruka truly needs.

Leaning forward, he presses his lips to Kakashi’s. It’s a chaste, masked kiss. The fabric is warm against Iruka’s lips, slightly damp from Kakashi’s rapid breathing. Iruka doesn’t deepen the kiss, but that must be enough, because Kakashi’s hyperventilation stops in an instant. His entire body straightens, but he doesn’t pull away. Iruka remains calm and still, the bubbling surface of Kakashi’s molten glass panic pouring and cooling into a smooth, even pane. Undisturbed and serene.

After many long, stretching moments, Kakashi draws in a single deep breath. Iruka gently draws away. As his eyes flutter open, he sees Kakashi watching him, almost questioningly, but no longer with panicked terror. Iruka gives him a wan smile, and sighs. “I’m sorry, Kakashi.” 

Kakashi’s brow furrows, but Iruka continues. He doesn’t need to know what Kakashi wants to say. Not right now. 

"It might have been unfair of me to barge in here and demand answers. Well..." Iruka flushes, rubbing the back of his neck with his free hand. The other is still clasped in Kakashi’s. It’s not easy to admit that his own hopes had been stacked so high, and he tries to find a way to phrase his apology without placing undue burden on Kakashi’s shoulders. Iruka’s approach had been all wrong. He had intended to gouge out answers with any force necessary; he failed to consider that the answers might not be there at all, that his chisel might slip into an open wound rather than hardened steel. 

"I'm not sorry for coming here, or for telling you how I feel. But I... I've been thinking about this for a while, and I guess I just assumed you had, too." 

He really had just assumed, hadn’t he? Even after convincing himself that he wasn’t going to take Kakashi’s affection for something it wasn’t, all of that flew out the window as soon as sexual desire specific to Iruka was admitted. He just… assumed that Kakashi’s feelings mimicked Iruka’s, and that those feelings would be enough to form the basis of a relationship. 

But they are both shinobi. Kakashi has been through struggles of his own that Iruka has never seen, and those struggles have left scars. Just as survival is never assured, just as desire to live doesn’t equate to immortality, simple emotions aren’t enough to ensure a commitment. That takes desire, bravery, empathy, and above all else, a willingness to fail. 

There are strong bonds that tie them, yes—but those bonds will remain, regardless of what is decided now.

Iruka squeezes Kakashi’s fingers in what he hopes is a reassuring gesture, before dropping them and taking a small step back. He needs to go, before the bitter strings of disappointment trying to drag his smile away gain a stronger hold. He chews his lip to dissuade it from sinking into a tremulous frown. Placing a hand on Kakashi’s bicep, Iruka nudges him firmly until Kakashi sidesteps, giving Iruka access to the door. Really, he would have made due with the window if he had to. Iruka has spent over a decade smiling through his tears. Now it’s far more important. Now, he isn’t trying to save his own pride, but Kakashi from guilt.

Iruka won’t disguise his desires, or his offer. But he can disguise the fragile hopes that will be crushed to ash when Kakashi rejects him. Those aren’t Kakashi’s responsibility to protect.

“Look… I want a relationship with you, but… I just want _you_ , even if all you can give me is your friendship.” Iruka says softly. He can’t discern what’s in Kakashi’s expression now, and he doesn’t want to try. He clears his throat of the tightness that grips it and ducks his head, his hand falling to the doorknob. “If you don't want anything more, I can live with that. I just want to know, so I stop wondering about what could be." 

Iruka is a liar. 

He’ll never stop wondering. 

His smile is a glass house on a seesaw, about to come crashing down, and Iruka doesn’t want Kakashi to get cut by the pieces. "I can give you some time. So think about it, ok?"

Iruka shuts the door behind him and pauses, because apparently he’s never gotten out of the habit of waiting for something he shouldn’t. 

It burns the soles of his feet when he finally walks away.


	16. Chapter 16

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so sorry for the delay, but here it finally is. As you all probably noticed, there's 17 chapters in both Unspoken and this, meaning we have one chapter left to go. That one chapter is what I was originally going to do as an epilogue to Unspoken, from Iruka's POV, and turned into this crazy 90k thing. Thank you so much for all of your patience thus far, and I hope the ending is satisfying. <3

The academy is operating under semi-normal capacity. Konoha is no better off on adequate high-ranking shinobi for the influx of missions than she was directly after the attack, but an end to restorations means a significant lightening of the workload within the village itself, and opportunistic attacks from neighboring nations are less likely now that their perimeter is fully restored. Tokubetsu are planned to take on more genin teams than in the past, freeing the regular jounin for the influx of A-ranks, and chuunin are stretched thin between B-ranks and manning local operations. The result is that class sizes have been temporarily increased by thirty percent to account for a decrease in the availability of teachers. Surprisingly, handling thirty-nine prepubescent children with pointy weapons and family jutsu is no easier than handling thirty. Who would have thought? 

Combined with Iruka’s work at the mission desk, which is more hectic than ever due to understaffing, he _should_ have more than enough to keep him busy. He _should_ be swamped by paperwork rather than the anxiety that chews on his tendons and bones. But his mind seems to have accounted for that lack of time, and has decided it will be most efficient if he reduces his sleep consumption to make room for everything. 

Sunday morning finds Iruka drinking massive amounts of black tea throughout the day. It’s only been one night since Kakashi’s questionable rejection, but Iruka was teetering on the edge already. It’s when he reduces himself to using the crappy tea bags from the break room that Izumo notices something is wrong. The normal Iruka will take instant ramen any meal of the day, but spends copious amounts of time (and no shortage of money) on properly brewed tea.

Izumo asks. There’s nothing Iruka can say. 

He’s waiting. And worrying. And wondering if he should have given Kakashi a recommended timeframe. If it took him a decade to even tap a few words to Iruka, how long could it take for him to decide where to take their (again, questionable) relationship? A lot longer than Iruka would prefer. Maybe too long. Kakashi could die on a mission before then, although that is a risk Iruka accepted long ago he would have to take. There’s no point dwelling on it. Or perhaps Kakashi will just take all this as an excuse to practice the delicate shinobi art of avoidance, and hide until Iruka figures out the answer for himself. 

Probably not. Kakashi is many things, and lazy can be one of them. But not in what's important. Kakashi would make a clean cut to the carotid, reject Iruka with indisputable finality and end his suffering. A merciful death. 

But Kakashi has to make his decision first.

It isn’t an easy one. Iruka gets that. He has his own doubts, ones that had stopped him from being explicitly forward when he initially recognized his interest in Kakashi. The logistics of their schedules alone would be hell, and their ideas for the future? Iruka has no idea if those match or not. He’s long since accepted he would never marry, but he has considered adopting in the future, after Naruto is fully grown and his own position at the academy leaves for more time at home. Kakashi is the last of a once prominent clan, and while his sharingan isn’t an inheritable kekkei genkai without the bloodline to match, it would be beneficial to Konoha if he passed on his talented genetics. And while Iruka doubts the social backlash they might receive for being a same-sex pairing would matter much to Kakashi, the idea of having a well-known weakness in the form of a partner might. 

It isn’t an easy decision. But Iruka made his own long ago.

Ten hours at the mission desk leave his muscles tight from disuse. He’s weary and mentally fatigued, but too hyped on caffeine to sleep. So, he cleans. It’s something Iruka hasn’t really done for nearly a year, since before his injury, other than the absolute basics of laundry and dishes.

Dust fills his lungs as he climbs the bookcases to wipe off the tops, and his ceiling fan drops enough lint on his bed that it would be easier to buy new sheets than try to wash it all off. Several spiders and a cockroach receive painless deaths. He wipes down the bathroom mirror with a cotton rag, rubbing circles into it until his forearm starts to ache and he surrenders to the futility of the exercise. The stubborn streaks just multiply like hydras each time he thinks he’s won. 

Appearing through the cracks in his preoccupation like weeds through a sidewalk, are thoughts of Kakashi. Idle wonderings, contingency plans, fretful concerns, and embarrassing memories that make him want to bash his forehead against the hydra-mirror. Only the thought of having to clean it again keeps him from doing it. 

Kakashi has known Iruka since he was a genin, at the least, an attention-seeking brat barely worth the hitai-ate on his forehead. Technically, Iruka doesn’t actually know much about Hatake Kakashi, even now. The events that led to Kakashi becoming who he is are unknown to Iruka, at least for the most part. He knows Kakashi blames himself for someone’s death, but honestly, most shinobi do, at least to a degree. There are certain things that go along with the life of a shinobi, no matter the rank. Kakashi’s experience in ANBU only means that he’s had more opportunities to stack up those regrets. 

That’s another thing, one that Iruka sees as a likely cause for Kakashi’s reticence: ANBU. 

There’s no way of knowing when he’ll leave. It could be a temporary assignment while Naruto is off training with Jiraiya, or Kakashi may be stuck in it for years to come. Iruka doesn’t know why he left to begin with. He does know a little of what being ANBU means.

Assassinations. Codenames. High likelihood of injury and death. Iruka remembers weeks or months spanning Kakashi’s visits to the memorial stone, so that’s a reasonable guess for the duration of missions. Even if Kakashi decides he wants Iruka, that doesn’t mean their relationship is guaranteed to work. It doesn’t mean there will be time to _have_ a relationship before one or both of them are killed. Realistically, probably the one of them in ANBU. It could happen any day, or it could happen in forty years. Kakashi is one of the most capable shinobi in the world, which means the demands placed on him for Konoha’s protection are that much higher. 

Iruka is willing to take that risk. If shinobi stopped forming bonds because they were likely to die young, the clans would have perished centuries ago. Death isn’t an incentive to hide behind shackles of fear and loss, but a reason to strive for them in the first place. Iruka has lost people he’s loved, both family and friends. He doesn’t regret knowing a single one. 

Kakashi thinks the same way. Iruka knows he does, for one specific reason: 

Pictures. 

If Kakashi truly thought that emotional ties were only weaknesses, that the loss outweighed the gain, then he wouldn’t choose to remember his old team. Grieving at the memorial stone might be accounted for by merely guilt, but not the portraits of smiling faces and dimpled cheeks captured in vibrant color. Kakashi wouldn’t place the happiness of the dead on his bedside table, not if his only concern were how he had failed them. The fact that he chooses to honor their lives rather than merely their deaths, means that he cherishes the bonds he made with them. 

The question is… is _Iruka_ worth it?

Over that, Iruka has no control. All he can do is wait. His own trust, his own bond is given; it’s up to Kakashi if he wants to pick up the line. 

The clock above the kitchen sink crawls past eight. It’s silent, but Iruka can imagine ticks with each jump of the second hand. He dries his hands on a towel, skin scrubbed fresh and thin from the wrist down. Suddenly, a tick of the second hand is accompanied by a tock. A sharp rap in double-time, bone against wood. The small size of his apartment means he’s twisting the doorknob by the time the third rap ends.

It shouldn’t be Kakashi. 

It’s barely been a full-day, and Kakashi is never early to _anything_. 

Except, apparently, to Iruka. 

Jounin garb and a fabric mask greet him. Kakashi’s gloved fist is raised, paused in the action of knocking. 

“Yo,” Kakashi’s eye arches and he opens his fist to give a casual wave. His posture is an abnormal mix between himself and Inu: tense, shoulders out of their characteristic slouch, but not quite standing at attention. Alert. Awkward. Anxious.

That last one might be Iruka projecting. 

He doesn’t know what he expected, but Kakashi showing up on his doorstep wasn’t on the list, and it kicks his brain into the sort of overdrive that stalls everything else. Maybe he thought Kakashi would find Iruka when he was training, or leaving the mission desk, or by dropping from a random tree on the academy grounds. 

Not a random tree, Iruka realizes. One with an excellent view of his own classroom.

No. A ridiculous thought. Isn’t it?

Kakashi is waiting.

Iruka’s face heats as he steps to the side, allowing the other room to enter. Really, Iruka would rather Kakashi just reject him now if he’s going to, but doing it outside with a potential audience probably isn’t Kakashi’s cup of tea. He mechanically shuts the door behind them. When he turns, Kakashi is taking in the cramped apartment; poorly organized books, worn couch, papers carelessly tossed on the kotatsu, Iruka. 

Who is sweaty and disheveled from cleaning, no vest, sleeves rolled up to his elbows, and hitai-ate starting to fall over one eyebrow. “I, uh—” Iruka clears his throat nervously as he pushes his hitai-ate into proper position. He feels frizzy strands sticking up around it and runs his hand back to redo his ponytail. His fingers pause on the hairtie when Kakashi catches his eye. Iruka shifts his weight and falls back on propriety. “Would you like some tea?” 

“Ah…” Kakashi’s hesitation trickles like dread through Iruka’s pores. Of course, if he’s here to reject Iruka, he wouldn’t want to stick around. But he eventually gives a slight nod. “Sure.”

Kakashi may not want the extra time, but Iruka decides he doesn’t mind a moment to gather himself. It takes time to shore up his defences, to stitch together a waterproof smile. 

“Take a seat. I’ll be right back.” He returns the nod stiffly and turns to the kitchen, aware of Kakashi watching him as he disappears. 

Each tea requires a slightly different process: different temperatures of water, different brew times, different heats at which they are the most aromatic to enjoy. He doesn’t know if Kakashi will be around long enough for any of that to matter, so he reaches for standard leaves that won’t be a shame to go to waste. 

His hand hesitates over the silver box. 

If he’s already given up, what chance do they really have? 

Iruka curses under his breath and switches to a more exotic variety, one he bought because it reminded him of his mother. She always called him an optimist. Now isn’t the time to prove her wrong.

While the kettle heats, Iruka sets off a burst of chakra, sensing Kakashi’s electric outline in his living room. He’s standing straight, hands in his pockets, facing the wall that holds Iruka’s bookcase and picture frames. Iruka can imagine that he has his cool persona slipped neatly into place, regardless of the answer he intends. Tonight, there’s no lingering epinephrine in his bloodstream, no difficult mission to shake off the remnants of with anxiety or lust. That’s a good thing. 

But Iruka hopes that persona won’t be the last one he sees.

Rolling down his sleeves, Iruka combs his fingers through his hair and fixes the stray strands into some semblance of order. After a moment of hesitation, he takes off his hitai-ate entirely and folds it in his pocket. Not preparing himself for battle, he reminds himself, no matter how much it feels that way. By the time the tea kettle whistles, the evidence of his fear is contained to the wasps buzzing in his esophagus and the sweat on his palms.

When he sets the tea tray on the kotatsu, Kakashi remains turned, observing the picture of Iruka and his parents that hangs above the low bookcase. Iruka steps up beside him and in his periphery sees Kakashi look over. His skin feels thin and flushed, but at least he’s certain his expression is under control. 

The picture is one that hung above the fireplace in the Umino household, taken about a year before the Kyuubi attack. About a year before Kakashi started watching him. “It keeps amazing me how long I’ve actually known you. But I guess you’ve known me for even longer than that.” Iruka murmurs. 

Kakashi doesn’t take the conversational bait.

If it’s between knowledge and uncertainty, Iruka will always choose the former. If Kakashi doesn’t want to drag this out, then they might as well get it over with. He turns to face the jounin, wary anticipation clenching a vice behind his navel. The words burst forth like water from a dam, betraying far too much in every rushing syllable. “What do you want from me?”

Kakashi fully faces him. The intensity in his face is out of place in the banal mundanity of Iruka’s apartment. Slowly, he raises one gloved palm, reaching out, calloused fingers slipping between Iruka’s. Then he keeps moving. Iruka watches as Kakashi raises their hands, worn leather slipping to cover Iruka’s knuckles as he places Iruka’s palm directly over his heart. The cloth of the flak jacket is rough against his skin, but Kakashi presses them together, closely, until Iruka can feel the blood pumping beneath the surface. It flows quickly, thin with something akin to battle furor, but there’s no enemy to face except for Iruka. 

Not adrenaline—excitement.

Iruka is the cause.

It’s a heady notion. He exhales deeply, entranced by the contrast of alabaster and warm sepia. Kakashi raises two fingers until their tips rest on the back of Iruka’s hand, an echo of Inu. But for the first time, Iruka can feel Kakashi’s warmth against his. For the first time, he can look up and see soft gray rather than endless black. For the first time, Kakashi gives the word weight with his voice as well. 

“ _Everything_.”

It’s a powerful promise, one that expands to fill every space in Iruka’s chest. As vague as that word has the potential to be, Iruka understands how it’s meant. It’s exactly like Kakashi; blunt and elusive, expressing dozens of ideas without admitting to a single one. But listing them isn’t necessary, ont at this point. Iruka has done all of that for him. 

Kakashi may not be able to ask for what he desires, not on his own—but he can, it seems, accept what Iruka offers first. It’s more than Iruka expected, enough to disintegrate the iron in his lungs. 

But, this time, Iruka needs to be selfish. He needs something in return.

“And what will you give me?” 

It’s a familiar dance; Iruka offers, Kakashi considers, Iruka waits. He waits now as Kakashi’s chest rises and falls beneath his touch, as Kakashi’s gaze turns inward. He expects another simple answer, something that Iruka will have to explore the depths of himself along the way. He can accept that, so long as he knows they’ll have that future. After all, it’s not as though he’s asking for a hand in marriage. Just… something solid, reciprocal. Something he can take and hold as assurance that, if Kakashi returns to Konoha, it will be to Iruka, as well. 

What he receives is far more than that.

Kakashi’s heart thrums quick and strong beneath his ribs. His free hand rises to curl around the edge of his mask. Kakashi’s eye slips closed as he tugs down dark fabric. 

It falls from the straight line of his nose. It descends over thin lips, reveals a punctuating beauty mark. It exposes a strong, smooth jaw, and the tender flesh of his throat. 

He is beautiful. 

But then, Iruka has always known that. 

It isn’t his appearance that is so striking, although Iruka happily drinks in every inch of Kakashi’s features, from the long scar that forms underneath his hitai-ate and slices down nearly to his lips, to the slight delineation where Kakashi’s mask shades his fair skin from the sun. 

It’s the sign of trust, and vulnerability, that accompanies this willing revelation. It’s the concept of Kakashi removing his masks, _all_ of them, and _inviting_ Iruka to see what lay beneath. It’s the barest red flush that tints his cheeks as his eyelid flutters open to watch Iruka, who doesn’t even try to hide the fascination with which he consumes every aspect of Kakashi’s being that he is willing to give.

Kakashi’s lips part, and for the first time, Iruka can match movement to the voice, one unfiltered by layers of cloth or porcelain or steel. 

“Everything. Iruka…” Kakashi says, quiet but certain, fingers sure as they clasp Iruka’s. “You have all of me.”

This time, when Iruka leans in to taste Kakashi’s lips, there’s no cloth between them. He can see, and he can feel, and he’s wanted this for so long that he forgets to be hesitant. Kakashi apparently does, too. He’s fervent and pressing, and Iruka meets him in every moment. Iruka takes what he wants with passion that bleeds and blooms in the friction between them. He tangles his fingers in Kakashi’s hair, and this time, it isn’t in an effort to comfort or bind. 

He does it because he _wants_ , and Kakashi does just as much.. 

If all of the pieces could slide into place so easily, Iruka would gladly take Kakashi to his bed then and there. He nearly does, when he starts to pull away and Kakashi chases him, greedily absorbing the elated chuckle that falls from Iruka’s lips. His grin can’t be contained well enough to allow them to keep kissing, and Kakashi eventually relents. Iruka gets to watch, with tender fluttering in his belly, as Kakashi _smiles_. His eye doesn’t curve into an arch, but it crinkles in the corners, soft as cotton and stealing whatever breath Iruka had left. 

“That better mean you want a relationship. Because damn it, Kakashi, I’m really tired of waiting.” He laughs huskily. Kakashi’s mouth stretches wider, sparking euphoria that Iruka can feel in his toes, in his veins, and on his skin as he slides his palm over the curve of Kakashi’s jaw. His mouth is soft and warm beneath the stroke of Iruka’s thumb—perhaps the only part of Kakashi that carries no scars. 

Kakashi’s lips part and nip Iruka’s thumb with sharp canines, an embarrassing noise of surprise leaping from his throat. The wolfish grin Kakashi gives darkens Iruka’s cheeks. “No more waiting.”

Iruka doesn’t want to question it, doesn’t want to risk bursting the bubble that’s currently holding him aloft in a gorgeous cloud, and he definitely doesn’t want to do anything to dull the shine in Kakashi’s eye. 

But he needs to be certain. 

Certain that this is what Kakashi wants, and not just what he believes Iruka does. 

Iruka sobers, gaze drifting down. He turns his hand in Kakashi’s grasp, lacing their fingers together. He slides the other down Kakashi’s jaw, the bunched fabric of his mask under his chin, and the lines of Kakashi’s vest, to finally rest on his waist. “After last night, I… I thought you didn’t want this. What changed?”

Kakashi’s lips twitch down, pressing together as his gaze darts to the side. His mouth is surprisingly expressive, and Iruka wonders if that’s a reason or consequence of the mask.  
“I never expected this.” Kakashi breathes heavily, fingers clenching against Iruka’s hip. He continues, tone thick and uncomfortable. “I didn’t plan for you to ever find out who I was. And even if you did, I never thought that you’d want— _me_.”

There’s so much weight packed behind that single syllable that it quakes on unstable foundation. Iruka can’t begin to fathom the depths that it goes, or the ludicrous reasoning behind it. From where he’s standing, Kakashi is one of the most brilliant people he’s ever met. Not in regards to being a shinobi, although that’s true as well. 

Kakashi’s worth isn’t from the sharingan, or deadly techniques. It’s a worth borne from devotion, and loyalty. Carved in principles, and the willingness to stand by them. It’s courage built from using his struggles as platforms for strength, rather than excuses for weakness. It’s shown by the miraculous ability to care for a stupid kid that he could have easily killed with one finger, but instead of derision, pity, or apathy—Kakashi chose to help, to trust, to _admire_. Kakashi’s worth is because he looks for and understands other’s pain. Kakashi is one of the very few people on this earth that gives a damn about the brash, foolish, clumsy, jinchuuriki named Uzumaki Naruto. 

His worth is in what he does for others. And there’s nothing Iruka can possibly respect more than that. 

Everything Iruka wants to say clings stickly, _painfully_ , in his throat. It’s painful to think that anyone could believe Kakashi to be cold and unfeeling. It’s painful to remember that Iruka himself once did. And it’s painful when Kakashi whispers hoarsely, fighting his own self-doubt to speak. 

“I was overwhelmed, and…” Kakashi’s eye squeezes closed. Perhaps someone else would consider that defensive, like Kakashi is trying to shut himself off from Iruka’s reaction. That isn’t it. A shinobi doesn’t let down their guard when preparing to meet a strike; they do when surrounded by teammates, comrades that they trust with their lives. That trust pops and burns, solar flares in Iruka’s heart. “I don’t want to hurt you.” 

That is the phrase that makes it all slide into place, that eases the knots and allows him to breathe deeply, almost easily, for the first time in far too long. But probably not as long as Kakashi has. Iruka may not be the most eloquent man in the world, and he can’t address all of Kakashi’s concerns. Not when so many of them have yet to be spoken, and not when Iruka is still figuring them out for himself. But this one thing… this is something Iruka understands. This is simple.

“Kakashi.” Iruka sighs, smiles and rubs his thumb in soothing circles against Kakashi’s hip. The jounin’s fingers flex tightly in his, but he doesn’t open his eye. “Kakashi.” He insists, gently. Kakashi looks up. “I don’t expect everything to be perfect. We’re… very different people.” A slight understatement, in Iruka’s opinion. “We have different goals, different views. Honestly, I could see all of this going up in flames pretty spectacularly.”

Kakashi’s brow rises as he shifts from concerned to dubious. Iruka laughs brightly, because the expression reminds him of his own reaction to the insipid romances Kakashi reads. It’s easy to guess that Kakashi expected a more optimistic proposition. “This isn’t a fairytale, Kakashi. We’re both independent people, and stubborn beyond belief. I’m sure we’ll have our fair share of fights. You _will_ hurt me, and I’m sure I’ll hurt you, too. But, at the end of the day…” Iruka shakes his head a bit, and inhales deeply. Kakashi’s scent follows him—grass and salt and something vaguely musty, like a dry dog. Maybe it isn’t what would be described in _Icha Icha Paradise_ , but it’s entirely Kakashi, and Iruka would gladly breathe it in every day of his life. He sighs. “I trust you. We don’t know everything about each other, but I know enough. I know that you’re the one I want to talk to. You’re the one I want to share everything with. And that’s worth fighting through everything else.”

“You really want to be with me.” The dubious expression is gone, something new swirling in its place. Iruka thinks that, just maybe, he isn’t the only one who has been fighting hope all along. 

It doesn’t require an answer, but Iruka gives one anyway.

“Yes.” 

Hope gives way to belief.

Kakashi crushes Iruka to him with the absolute, enveloping warmth, of someone who has unlocked his own restraints, reached the desert oasis, and found it real. 

Kakashi is solid, tangible. For the first time, Iruka doesn’t wonder if he’ll disappear as soon as Iruka lets go.

Maybe the “you idiot” he was going to add can wait another day.


	17. Chapter 17

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WARNINGS: NSFW for **sex** , also **implied/referenced mild self-harm**.
> 
> I am so incredibly sorry for the delay in this ending. Real life sure is a pain, huh? But this is finally finished, and I'm so happy to get this out. Iruka deserves his own ending, too. 
> 
> Thank each and every one of you for the amazing support you've given me and this story. I'm going to keep writing, and I hope to experience just as many stories with you all in the future. 
> 
> Happy Independence Day to anyone in the USA, and stay safe. <3

When Kakashi comes back the next night, no one is close to, or literally, dead. There’s no adrenaline in the jōnin’s blood, no teartails on Iruka’s cheeks, and Kakashi knocks on the door rather than hiding in a tree. 

It’s a pleasant change. A good omen, Iruka thinks, for the future. Or perhaps just a new precedent to reset the years of missed chances.

When Kakashi’s fingers fall to replace his mask after a sip of tea, they hesitate, then drop to his lap. Iruka smiles around the liquid that warms his belly. The mask remains down long after their cups are empty and Iruka’s voice has grown hoarse.

That’s an even better one. 

The night after that, Kakashi shows up at his window rather than his front door. As long as it’s not a tree branch, Iruka can’t bring himself to complain for more than a minute. 

The amused crinkle of Kakashi’s eye and tilt to his head probably means he can see the flush to Iruka’s cheeks isn’t quite from anger. 

That night, Kakashi removes his mask before Iruka can even set the kettle to heat. 

He tastes of coffee and mint. After the tea, he tastes just as good.

When Iruka comes home from the Academy to find a torn piece of paper sitting on his kettle, adorned with only a scribbled henohenomoheji, he knows what it means. It doesn’t make him happy. Not exactly. Kakashi can’t tell Iruka how long he’ll be gone, or where he will be going. He can’t say if he’s likely to come back at all. If Kakashi is gravely injured, Iruka won’t know until he’s recovered. If he dies in the line of duty, Iruka may never know until he sees the name appear on the memorial stone. That’s what being part of ANBU means, and this note only reinforces the complete anonymity in which Kakashi now lives.

But the note doesn’t hurt, either. Because although Iruka knows all of that, although he goes home to an empty bed, wakes up in the night to the image of a lifeless gray eye, and spends the hours until sunrise looking into the forest for a hint of silver…

Iruka is hopeful. 

The note is something more than a notification.

It’s a request for a rain check. 

It’s a vow that Kakashi will try to stay safe.

It’s a promise for the future. 

It’s nearly three weeks later when Kakashi shows up at his doorstep with a bag of groceries and an enticing smile. The food tastes so good, Iruka hardly remembers to be embarrassed that Kakashi knows him well enough to guess his kitchen is full of nothing but instant ramen, dry chicken, and cheap frozen vegetables. 

That forgetfulness might also have to do with the nerves that electrify him when he invites Kakashi to stay the night. He backtracks quickly, saying that nothing has to happen—which is true—but apparently Kakashi isn’t any more keen to wait than he is. It’s another intimacy, another piece of trust Kakashi is giving him, even if it has been had by others before.

Intellectually, Iruka is aware of the differences in their levels of experience, both on the field and in the bedroom. He’s aware that Kakashi has had multiple partners before, including those more attractive and skilled than Iruka. But he doesn’t really think it matters. Not when Kakashi’s hands search for him in every moment. Not when they cling to him desperately, leaving vibrant heat as tangible as splashes of candle wax against his skin. 

Kakashi removes Iruka’s shirt as if he’s never wanted anything more, and readily accepts a return of the favor. Kakashi is as gorgeous as Iruka remembers from the academy room, all sleek lines and sinuous muscles. There are a few more scars than Iruka recalls. He will never get the history behind most of them, stories sealed behind emotional walls or legal classification. It doesn’t matter. Iruka can touch them now, taste them, and see the man that they made. That means far more than a story ever could.

In other aspects of their relationship, Kakashi has been content to allow Iruka to lead, whether it’s broaching a new conversational topic or choosing what type of tea they drink. Tonight, he is not. He moves with eager assurance. Iruka’s scalp tingles as Kakashi slides the tie from his hair, dark waves caressing his shoulders. Kakashi tangles his hands in them, smoothing the strands between his fingers as his mouth explores from Iruka’s neck to his collarbone and beyond. Rosy stains erupt in the wake of Kakashi’s tongue and canines, stacking tension with each diligently placed brick. 

That tension threatens to snap when Kakashi falls to his knees. He looks up at Iruka with a charcoal eye, pupil blown wide. He pushes Iruka’s remaining two layers past his hips, wraps his fingers around Iruka’s thighs, and suddenly Iruka is enveloped by the sweetest suction. Iruka gasps. He has to squeeze his eyes shut for a moment, because Kakashi wastes no time and takes him alarmingly far, alarmingly fast. Consequently, Iruka is alarmingly close to _finishing_ , alarmingly fast. 

When Iruka can breathe again without shooting off like a genin, he wraps his hand in soft silver strands. 

He is enraptured by the sight before him. 

Despite their positions, Iruka standing and Kakashi kneeling on the floor, there is nothing submissive about Kakashi in that moment. He is glorious and powerful, taking to pleasuring Iruka as if it’s an S-rank jutsu he wants to make his own. And really, Iruka has always been Kakashi’s, but never has he been so thoroughly contented by that fact. Kakashi’s hair crumples between Iruka’s fingers and his lips stretch around his length. When his fingers dig into Iruka’s thighs and pull him deeper, Iruka can do nothing but tremble in the face of Kakashi’s remarkable efforts to make him come before they can even get to the bed. 

Knocking off Kakashi’s hitai-ate, Iruka bares every inch of his lover that he can. He revels in sheer gratitude.

Because this is _his_. 

For the first time, Iruka sees the entirety of Kakashi’s face, both eyes included. He traces the rough edges of the scar with his thumb as Kakashi’s sharingan opens. The red glows stark against shades of white and pink and silver, but it isn’t the swirling tomoe that capture Iruka’s breath and soul. 

It’s the dilated pupil in it’s gray partner. It’s the liquid that wells there and slips, as a single tear, down Kakashi’s unscarred cheek. 

It’s the love and devotion that Iruka can never doubt again. 

“Kakashi,” Iruka murmurs the name as a reverent prayer, but also as a plea to stop. The static of Kakashi’s chakra is building behind his navel now, seeping into his muscles and making his thighs tremble, and Iruka doesn’t want this to happen quite yet. He wants to give something to Kakashi first, to show how thoroughly that adoration is reciprocated. Kakashi ignores the request and Iruka hisses in rising pleasure. He tugs Kakashi’s hair and slips a hand around a pale, unscarred throat, exerting just enough gentle pressure to urge him back. Kakashi follows unwillingly, lips swollen and shiny, brows furrowed. 

Iruka is very close to questioning his own sanity over it, himself. 

He takes a second to gather his nerves before they set off a chain reaction, and smiles reassuringly. It’s not easy to stop touching Kakashi long enough to stumble back to the bed, but he does it, because he has a goal in mind, has had it for weeks. 

He fumbles in his dresser drawer and pulls out a small bottle, holding it up to forgo words. 

Not everyone is interested in what Iruka is asking for, and he can live with it if Kakashi isn’t—but he _wants_ it. He wants to feel Kakashi, in every way he can. It transcends a physical urge and becomes an emotional desire. One that he expresses with an embarrassed flush that almost overrides the awareness that he’s sitting nude on his mattress, glistening interest on full display. 

Kakashi _laughs_ , high and gleeful, and only the pure joy of the sound keeps Iruka’s stomach swooping in something other than mortification. The eager way Kakashi shucks his pants and presses Iruka onto his back also helps dispel any lingering doubts. He braces himself with one hand beside Iruka’s head (unintentionally tugging on his hair a little painfully, but that’s hardly important), and the other wraps around Iruka’s fingers and the bottle. 

Iruka captures Kakashi’s stretched lips for his own. For several seconds, Kakashi seems to forget where they’re supposed to be going with this, losing clear direction for the first time in the evening. Iruka gives him a reminder with a tilt of his hips, pressing them together intimately, shuddering as he feels Kakashi’s erection against him. Kakashi hisses in pleasure, jerking in an instinctive bid for more, but he gets the message. He pulls back just enough to open the bottle and slick his fingers, the bland scent of silicone filling the room. Iruka hears a thump that he presumes is the bottle falling to the side. He can’t take his eyes off of Kakashi long enough to check.

Kakashi is miles of pale, scarred skin, as lovely and ethereal as moonlight. He is lean and deadly, and every inch of that precise strength, his indomitable intent, is focused on Iruka.

Iruka wants to touch, to feel, because it’s hard to believe such a beautiful creature could even exist in the mortal world. 

But he does. 

And he belongs to _Iruka_.

Iruka belongs to _him_.

Anticipating the cool touch of Kakashi preparing him, Iruka shifts his legs further apart. It’s only the heat of Kakashi, hard against him, that keeps him from feeling self-conscious about the vulnerable position. But instead of the sensation he expects, Iruka feels Kakashi’s breath falter, lips stuttering to a halt against Iruka’s, and Kakashi’s shoulder tense.

It takes an embarrassingly long moment, in which Iruka opens his eyes and sees the furrow of Kakashi’s brows, the concentrated way his eyes squeeze shut, for Iruka to realize.

Kakashi is preparing himself. 

“Oh,” Iruka breaths.

Many more realizations follow that first one.

There was no logical reason for Iruka to assume that he would be the one penetrated. Perhaps it’s conditioning from his very limited experience with sex. Perhaps it’s because he still has trouble remembering that Kakashi is just as invested in this as Iruka is. Maybe it’s difficult to envision someone who had the power to lead a shinobi nation opening himself so easily, without question, for someone like Iruka. 

Either way, he realizes that he has absolutely _no_ issue with the direction Kakashi has taken them. He has considered this before, in his guiltiest of thoughts. He’s found release to the image of Kakashi on his bed, against a wall, in the shower, on the floor, over his desk—just about everywhere that Iruka has ever been, and some he hasn’t. But there was always a strange disconnect, some small part of him that never believed it could be real.

Now, it’s very real.

His final realization, as he takes in the rigidity of Kakashi’s body, the tightness in his features, is that _Kakashi hasn’t done this before_. 

“ _Oh_.” 

Iruka swallows, eyes wide with awe. Kakashi’s eyes flicker open and a bead of sweat slides down the curve of his neck. Kakashi tilts his head questioningly, but he doesn’t stop moving. Although the uncomfortable set to his muscles is still there, his erection hasn’t flagged. His gaze burns and sparks as brightly as a bonfire, sending shockwaves of lust down Iruka’s spine. 

Then he twitches, and Iruka doesn’t think it’s from pleasure. He swallows down his wonder and remembers he isn’t a passive partner in this whole thing. He doesn’t exactly have a plethora of experiences to draw upon, but he does know that this isn’t supposed to _hurt_. 

“Let me,” Iruka murmurs roughly, too loud between their harsh breaths. He braces Kakashi’s narrow hip with one hand and slides the other to meet Kakashi at his entrance. He twines their fingers, spreading the slickness to his own. 

Kakashi’s forehead drops to Iruka’s, his breathing deepening and hands fisting in the sheets beside Iruka’s head. It takes a minute of slow, easing movements, of soothing circles and gentle brushes and tender slides, but Kakashi slowly opens to him, softening and yielding to his patience. 

But really, it isn’t patience at all, because Iruka enjoys every second of it.

For as long as Iruka has been on the edge now, he isn’t viewing an orgasm as the culmination to reach. Not his own, at least. He loves the pressure of Kakashi’s weight hovering above him, the slow circles that Kakashi rubs against him after Iruka adds more lubrication. He relishes the way Kakashi becomes more involved again as his pain eases, drawing a gasp from Iruka by paying wet attention to his earlobe, nipping sharply at his jugular, sucking a bruise into his shoulder. 

By the time Kakashi considers himself ready, they are both overheated and dancing on a precipice, but it’s an edge Iruka wants to live on for the rest of his life. 

It’s a miracle he doesn’t fall off entirely when Kakashi’s molten heat envelopes him. 

Iruka has often thought of Kakashi as a honed weapon, or a feline predator. Those aren’t enough. 

Kakashi moves against him, savoring each sweet drag of flesh, the sweat that builds between their skin. 

They aren’t nearly enough.

Kakashi is a force of nature, raw and primal. Iruka is consumed by him, as a single leaf within the eye of a tsunami, only resisting destruction through the grace of the storm itself. Kakashi is his most beautiful, Iruka thinks, when he holds nothing back. When his emotions flood him to the point of breaking and they flow forth like rapids. Iruka is the white foam riding atop that sheer power, in awe that he’s allowed to touch at all. 

And Kakashi does allow him to touch. He allows Iruka everything, and gives all of himself in return. He swallows Iruka low groans and sighs and returns them with his own, exposing himself in so much more than body. 

He trusts Iruka with everything. 

“Beautiful,” Kakashi whispers as a shiny drop leaves a trail down his cheek. Iruka’s fingernails leave crescent marks on Kakashi’s hips. “Warm,” he groans as he rises on shaky thighs. “Thank you,” he mindlessly praises as his lips begin to tremble. “Yours,” he gasps as he sinks down until he’s cradled in Iruka’s pelvis, connected intimately. 

_‘Love,’_ Kakashi taps against Iruka’s collarbone as bliss takes him. 

Iruka doesn’t know if he says more, because his heart beats madly in his ears. Every sense is so focused on Kakashi that rhythm loses meaning, and all that exists is the sweet press of Kakashi against him. 

His ecstasy is blinding, because _Kakashi’s_ is. 

When he can see again, Kakashi is watching him, and Iruka sees every word in the soft glow of his face.

As Kakashi collapses on top of him, slick evidence trapped between them, Iruka rubs circles into his lover’s spine. 

Not out of comfort, or sympathy—out of a simple desire to, and a knowledge that it will be accepted. 

The next morning, Iruka wakes from a dreamless sleep. He’s warm despite the cold room. Long arms are wrapped around his stomach, keeping his back pressed to Kakashi’s front. Iruka knows Kakashi is awake when he nuzzles into Iruka’s loose hair, brushing his lips against Iruka’s neck without form or thought. 

Kakashi is sleep-warm and tender. This apartment has never felt safe to Iruka. Nothing really has, since the Kyuubi attack. 

But with Kakashi’s strength surrounding him, it’s hard to feel anything else. 

“Where else are you hurt?” Iruka asks as he sets the medical kit on his knees, rifling through it for the wound cleaner. It has seen substantially more use in the last few months than it had in the several years prior. 

Kakashi is perched on the edge of his bathtub, fully clothed except for his usual fingerless gloves. “Nowhere.” He reaches out his hands obediently, allowing Iruka to gently hold them while he examines the damage. He cuts a suspicious glance up at Kakashi, who opens his eye wide in earnesty that is utterly out of place on his features. “You can’t really think I would lie to you. Iruka, I’m _hurt_.”

“I do, and you aren’t.” Iruka frowns as he holds Kakashi’s right hand, the worst of the two, close to his face. The skin is inflamed and bloodied, but the damage is mostly surface level. Several layers of skin are ripped and torn. Iruka would say it looks as though Kakashi was shredded by animal claws, except the individual lines are too wide and blunt for that, and the skin surrounding the striations is chafed like low-grit sandpaper. The confines of the damage to Kakashi’s hands is also highly unusual. It spans both palm and knuckles, unlike most defensive wounds. His first thought was lightning or fire chakra, but there’s no sign of heat damage. “Weren’t you wearing gloves?”

“If I was, they certainly didn’t work very well.”

Iruka peers up, but although Kakashi’s mask is lowered, he’s just as hard to read as ever. He sighs and pops the cap on the wound cleaner, holding Kakashi’s wrist over the tub while he pours a generous amount over his hand, twisting it to catch each side. Kakashi doesn’t make a sound despite the sting. When Iruka dabs at the torn skin with gauze, the pad comes away a dark rust color. 

The wounds were clear of debris to begin with, but Iruka diligently cleans them despite. As he does, doubt creeps into his mind like vicious kudzu, wrapping vines around his heart and sinking ice in his stomach. 

“Kakashi,” Iruka says quietly. He smooths his thumbs over the inside of Kakashi’s wrists, over blue veins trapped beneath translucent skin. Kakashi seems strangely fragile in this lighting; washed out and corpse-like, other than the crimson blood that puddles in the tub. “The medics didn’t heal these because you didn’t have them when you came back. Right?”

The bathroom is too quiet, the room too small. When Kakashi finally speaks, he keeps his eye trained on Iruka’s fingers. His throat sounds as tight as Iruka’s feels. 

“I wouldn’t have let a medic heal them.” 

Kakashi has a tendency to answer in roundabout ways, even when he’s actually telling the truth. But in this case, Iruka takes it as confirmation. 

“Can I?”

Kakashi’s jaw flexes and his fingers twitch in Iruka’s grip. He feels cold. He looks cold. 

Slowly, he nods. 

Iruka rests the backs of Kakashi’s wrists on his knees and gathers healing chakra, focusing first on the palms, which have taken the worst damage. 

No.

Which _Kakashi_ damaged the most.

Iruka can see what they are now. He wasn’t entirely wrong; they are claw marks. Just not from any summons or beast. 

They are from Kakashi himself. 

The sharp scent of iodine burns Iruka’s nostrils. Nausea churns in his stomach, but he concentrates on his task and Kakashi’s deep, controlled breaths. He works until all that remains are the smooth, pink lines of tender new flesh. 

They sit for several minutes longer. Kakashi seems to be waiting for something, but Iruka doesn’t know what. 

He _wants_ to yell, to shake Kakashi until he explains why he would hurt himself, and why he would make Iruka heal it. 

He also wants to hold Kakashi until whatever caused this is gone, whisper meaningless comforts and kiss every inch of his skin like it would actually solve anything. 

Instead, Iruka settles on the only truth he knows. 

“I don’t want you to hurt yourself.” 

Kakashi meets Iruka’s eyes. His own is intent, searching. Iruka grips Kakashi’s wrists tighter. 

The air leaves Kakashi in a single, long breath. His shoulders droop, his eye closes, and he rocks forward until Iruka is half-supporting him, the metal of his hitai-ate cool against Iruka’s forehead. 

“Yeah.” Kakashi sighs. “Ok.”

Later, Iruka asks him if it’ll be that easy. 

“Not easy.” Kakashi says. He is combing his newly healed fingers through Iruka’s hair, spreading it on the pillow in some abstract pattern only he can see. “But now I have a reason to try.”

When Kakashi wakes him the next morning, it’s with too-strong tea and a tickle of damp hair. He mutters something about breakfast, and Iruka stumbles to the shower. By the time he’s out, there’s steamed rice with fried eggs and green onions waiting for him (apparently the closest thing Iruka had to a vegetable in his fridge). 

Kakashi must have gone home at some point because his uniform is fresh and he tastes of a toothpaste too minty to be Iruka’s. A light bubble expands in Iruka’s chest. 

That means Kakashi plans to spend long enough with him today that it matters. 

It’s a day off from the Academy, so Iruka only has a mission desk shift starting after lunch. Kakashi could be called away at any moment, of course, but they don’t talk about that. They don’t need to. It’s a fact of life for shinobi, as inevitable as breath for the living.

The limited time together, the uncertainty, the risks—they are all worth it. 

Iruka would rather have a single night with Kakashi than months with anyone else. 

They work together on dishes from breakfast, Iruka washing while Kakashi dries. Their hips and elbows bump as they trade off plates, and Kakashi’s hands pause for a long, strange moment. Then, he suddenly speaks. 

“Will you come to the memorial stone with me?” 

Iruka nearly drops a cup back into the sink, reflexes managing to save it just in time. Kakashi’s lips twitch for a moment as if heading for a smile, then quickly flatten. Iruka is starting to learn that Kakashi’s face, even exposed as it is now, is far less expressive than Iruka’s could ever be. 

He looks forward to learning the other ways Kakashi expresses himself.

“I want to introduce you to them.” Kakashi says. “If you want to.” 

The weather is getting cold, winter rolling in with frigid spikes that remind him of a scratchy blanket he still has to ask about, but Iruka is no stranger to the memorial stone at any time of year. He remembers freezing snow sloshing into his boots, winds so fierce that they cut at his cheeks like a sandstorm. He remembers waiting for someone who never came. 

Iruka doesn’t have to wait anymore. 

They kneel before the memorial. Kakashi places his left hand on the stone, leaving fingerprints against a single name amongst dozens of others. It’s an old name, higher than those of Iruka’s parents, high enough that it must have been there before the Kyuubi. 

Kakashi is quiet for several minutes, but then his right palm covers Iruka’s, and he begins to speak. 

“Obito. I know you said you’d rather eat a slug than hear about my love life, but...”

Iruka swears that, when Naruto comes home, he’ll bring him here, too. Umino Ikkaku and Koharu valued family above all else. 

It’s only fair that they meet Iruka’s new one.

Iruka is never going to change the world. 

He isn’t a brilliant leader like Kakashi. He doesn’t have fountains of determination and power like Naruto. He doesn’t have the patience or the intelligence of the Sandaime. 

One day, the name Hatake Kakashi will appear on the memorial stone, and there is nothing Iruka can do to prevent that. He stays home, and he waits, knowing that every mission that Kakashi goes on could be the last.

But he no longer focuses on the moments Kakashi is gone. He doesn’t count the empty days, and each spare second isn’t wrought with uncertainty. 

Instead, Kakashi expands to fill every space in Iruka’s life. The times they are together become more important than the times they’re apart. Iruka’s bed dips down in the middle instead of one side. Fresh eggplant stocks the fridge. Silver stubble scratches Iruka’s cheek instead of a blanket, and sometimes Kakashi hums while he’s in the shower. 

_Home_ has always been a set of memories to Iruka. His father’s laugh, happy voices, his mother’s shampoo, her fingers in his hair, a lipstick smile. He never gave up the idea of having that again, but for too long, he searched for it from the dead. He searched for a way to regain what he lost. 

But home doesn’t have to be set in stone. There are no requirements, no idyllic standards to meet. Home is the place that the strongest bonds lead. For the Sandaime, it was Konoha. For his parents, it was their cozy little house, with a large fireplace, each other, and Iruka. 

Kakashi isn’t used to having a home, either in place or person. He takes incredible leaps at times, then withdraws for days or weeks, as if suddenly realizing how far his inner self has been exposed. Sometimes, Iruka thinks Kakashi fights himself more than he does the enemy. 

But he always comes back. As long as he lives, he always will. 

So even when the eggplant goes bad when Kakashi’s missions take too long, even when the sheets are cold, even when green eyes haunt Iruka’s dreams, even when Kakashi returns with blood on his clothes and skin like ice… Iruka finds happiness. Because none of those things are important. There’s always more eggplant to buy, more dreams to have. Kakashi will always keep him warm when it counts. 

What matters is that Iruka no longer has to wait to be found. 

Because Iruka has found his home. 

He’s found Kakashi.

Iruka’s wish on the night of the summer festival finally comes true, and Kakashi’s message along with it. Iruka feels it, even on the days when his apartment is empty. He feels it for both of them.

_‘I hope you’re alive and well.’_

_‘Mission accomplished’_


End file.
